Ronald Reagan Presidential Library

When James Dean Design developed the goals for the re-landscape of the Ronald Reagan Library the focus was on: the design being presidential; it needed to be sustainable for at least 100 years; the design of the library needed to bear a relationship to the grounds of the White House.

Planted in a formal arrangement are 43 Crape Myrtle trees. Each tree was a gift to the President and Nancy Reagan as a part of a fund raising project. Together this arrangement has been named as Gipper's Grove.

The Ronald Reagan Presidential Library is perched on a significant mountain top overlooking the Tierra Rejada Valley within Simi Valley, Calif. and at the boundary with Thousand Oaks in Ventura County. On a clear day, from the site, one can see the ocean and beyond to the Channel Islands. We are told that President Reagan chose the site for its rural nature and the magnificent views. In 2003 Duke Blackwood, director of the Ronald Reagan Foundation, asked advice of James Dean Design regarding the existing landscape conditions at the site. At the end of the visit he took me onto a restricted area. I was astounded when he announced that this small area was the future memorial site of the 40th president. I expressed my opinion that the small monument was not fitting of a great world leader.

Blackwood asked how I would change the site. My response was that a 100-year plan should be developed and implemented since the site would eventually serve as a national monument. I also felt that the grounds might relate to the design character of the Olmstead Plan for the White House. The following day, we were asked by Blackwood and the Ronald Reagan Foundation if we would provide a redesign of the Memorial Site, the West Lawn area, and Gripper's Grove on a pro bono basis. Of course we accepted the opportunity to give back to the community and the country. The project was to be designed and built over a five year period as funding became available.

The original design for the West Lawn area was influenced by the plan for the White House developed by President Rutherford B. Hayes (1878) and later embellished by Fredrick Law Olmstead Jr. in 1930. Our design features large oval shaped walkways with a circular planter in the middle that emulated the ellipse pattern of the Hayes/Olmstead design of the White House.