author
Calvert Vaux
1824–1895
An English-born architect and landscape designer, he helped shape some of America’s most beloved public spaces, including Central Park and Prospect Park. His work blended buildings, bridges, and landscapes into scenes that still feel inviting today.
1 Audiobook
Description of a plan for the improvement of the Central Park
by Frederick Law Olmsted, Calvert Vaux
About the author
Born in London in 1824, Calvert Vaux trained as an architect before moving to the United States in 1850 at the invitation of landscape writer and designer Andrew Jackson Downing. After Downing’s death, Vaux continued building a career that joined architecture with a deep interest in natural scenery.
He is best remembered for his partnership with Frederick Law Olmsted. Together they created the winning Greensward Plan for Central Park, and they went on to work on Prospect Park in Brooklyn and park systems in places including Buffalo. Vaux believed parks should offer beauty, calm, and easy access to ordinary city residents, not just the wealthy.
Beyond parks, he designed houses, museum buildings, bridges, and ornamental details, often in a picturesque style that worked with the landscape rather than against it. He died in 1895, but his ideas about public green space and thoughtful urban design still shape how many Americans experience their cities.