Required Reading: New York City of Trees by Benjamin Swett - Gardenista
Photographs by Benjamin Swett. Just as pets resemble their owners, the 5.2 million trees that manage to survive in Manhattan and its boroughs closely echo the mad mix of humanity that calls the metropolis home. For his book, New York City of Trees, Swett roamed the city, from the Bronx to Washington Square Park to Staten Island, and from garden to sidewalk to highway median, photographing and chronicling the stories behind some of New York’s wildest and most stalwart residents. This tulip tree, the tallest tree in Queens, overlooks six lanes of traffic on the Long Island Expressway. Swett wasn’t fixed on merely finding out the age of the 50 or so trees he investigated; he wanted to celebrate their connection to New York history and the impact trees have on those who live in their midst. He photographed this Yoshino cherry, one of 27 specimens that form a double row along the east side of the Central Park Reservoir, early in the morning “before the sun had a chance to introduce its fatal yellows.” It arrived in 1912, he tells us, as part of a gift of 2,000 cherry trees to the city from the city of Tokyo, and was a replacement for an earlier shipment, to celebrate the 300th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s exploration of the Hudson, that was entirely lost at sea. “As everyone knows, the tree of heaven is a weed tree, a vicious invasive that would take root in a soda can if given the opportunity,” writes Swett. A flourishing Chinese Maidenhair ginkgo overlooks Broadway along the southeast corner of Isham Park, in Inwood. Swett traces this one’s origins to the late 1860s or 1870s when it was likely planted at the entrance of tanner William B. Isham’s estate, now an urban park with nothing like an estate in the vicinity. Swett captured this English elm in Madison Square Park as it was failing. The horse chestnut and osage orange later came in vogue, followed by the soon-to-be-diseased American elm, and, in more recent years, the resilient Callery pear, honeylocust, and Norway maple. Swett was drawn to this European Hornbeam at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, not because it’s exotic or impressively old or tall, but because it’s so good looking. While passing a parking lot en route to a Chelsea art opening, Swett discovered one of his favorite trees, a humble Callery pear. Callery pear trees, Swett says, are prized for their fast growth, tolerance to pollution, and beauty in all seasons. In the most poignant portrait in his book, Swett captured the crane that he discovered in place of his tree–removed out of the blue to make way for an extension of the No. A century-old copper beach with an auburn afro-like canopy stands at the top of the lawn at Wave Hill, a tiny gem of a public garden in the Bronx where in fall and spring Swett teaches a series of tree photography classes. Like most successful New Yorkers, the American elm has the ability to bend and stretch rather than be crowded out. This one, likely planted in 1934 by Robert Moses’ crew, grows on the side of Harlem River Drive originally known as the Speedway. New York City of Treesis available for $11.01 from Amazon. Trees of New York City, a new edition of the book, came out in 2017 from Countryman Press. As part of the Parks Department’s program to preserve the genetic stock of the city’s designated Great Trees, these Katsuras, he reassures us, have been cloned and eventually will be planted in all five boroughs.