Natural look advocated for Carrie Furnaces site
-
Blueweed (Echium vulgare) and crown vetch (Securigera varia) grow in a meadow near the Carrie Furnaces, a remainder of U.S. Steel's Homestead Works. PG slideshow: 'Leave It to Time' -
Rick Darke, a nationally known horticulturist, photographer and author, shows a sample of vegetation at the 30-acre Carrie Furnaces site. -
Carrie Furnaces seen from a helicopter in July 2006, showing how much of an unedited "wild garden" existed on the site five years ago. -
Inside the abandoned Carrie Furnaces, spray-painted "artworks" mix with remnants of the Industrial Age.
Share with others:
In a hovering helicopter without a rear door, horticulturist Rick Darke took photographs above the Monongahela River during the summer of 2006. While working on a botanical project, his eye caught 90-foot high steel towers and he asked the pilot to make a U-turn for a closer look.
From the air, Mr. Darke became enamored of the Carrie Furnaces. Built in 1884 and stretching over 30 acres that straddle Swissvale and Rankin, the mill was part of U.S. Steel's Homestead Works, turning out iron that was forged into steel across the river in Homestead, then used in the Empire State Building and the doors to the Panama Canal. The mill closed in 1982 and was designated a national historic landmark in 2006.
Mr. Darke, a landscape architect, photographer and author, loves the look of this relic of the industrial age. But he's even more captivated by the wild garden that envelops it. Around the furnaces, which are rare examples of pre-World War II iron-making technology, Mr. Darke notes meadows filled with St. John's wort, sweet clover and goat's beard as well as sycamore, poplar and sumac trees.
To Mr. Darke, the Carrie Furnaces are a palimpsest, a piece of parchment that's been written on many times and, though partially erased, is still legible.
"It's here as a monument to a period," he said, adding that we should "take what we've built and bring it into the modern narrative."
You can see what the Carrie Furnaces look like today on tours led by Rivers of Steel staff members at 9, 10 and 11 a.m. Cost is $25 per person. Other tour dates are Sept. 17 and Oct. 15.
Mr. Darke's idea for reinterpreting a mill site is an approach popularized by Irish horticulturist William Robinson in his 1870 book, "The Wild Garden." Mr. Robinson befriended scientist Charles Darwin and became a darling of British gardeners. He transformed the 1,100-acre grounds of Gravetye Manor in Sussex, England, and is known as the father of the English flower garden.
Mr. Robinson believed it made more sense for plants to adapt to a site rather than adapting the soil to them. He believed in placing plants "where they will thrive without further care." Henry Francis du Pont owned a copy of Mr. Robinson's classic and used it as his blueprint for shaping the vast grounds of Winterthur, his estate in Delaware.
First Published August 20, 2011 12:00 am
