Why New York?

The Cloisters, in the heart of the park, is a New York City landmark and branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art perched at the highest point on the island of Manhattan. The Cloisters incorporates parts from five European abbeys which were disassembled and shipped to New York City in the 1930s and contains over 5000 Medieval works of art, including the famous unicorn tapestries. The building is surrounded with gardens planted according to horticultural information obtained from medieval manuscripts and artifacts. Nearby there is an open plaza with views of the George Washington Bridge, which is often used for wedding ceremonies (and which will be used for ours!), and a block from the house where Jen grew up, the only waterfront restaurant in New York, La Marina, with a magnificent sunset view of the George Washington Bridge, and plenty of space for a fantastic party. (Since its recent refurbishment, it has become one of the hottest night spots in New York, and we will have it all to ourselves.) So there are all the great physical elements for a great wedding location.

But the biggest reason we thought of New York was that we'd love this wedding to be a kind of gathering of the tribes. Most of our extended family and many friends live within driving distance of New York. Most of Tim's brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, are in Virginia or Chicago; Jen's parents live in New York, and her extended family hails from Oklahoma and Texas. We even hope that we can entice down Tim's cousins from Canada - the Balkas to meet the Pahlkas. And we are hopeful that friends and family from California will look at a long weekend in New York as a wonderful spring holiday!

When and Where

About the Area

Many New Yorkers have never really explored upper Manhattan, but it is well worth the short trip uptown. Inwood, the area where Jen grew up, has become a vibrant area with many restaurants and nightclubs, but the greatest attractions are outdoors. Inwood Hill Park, directly opposite Jen's mother's house, is the last "wilderness" on the island of Manhattan, a sprawling 196 acre park with running and walking trails, and a great view of the New Jersey Palisades. Just to the south is Fort Tryon Park and the Cloisters. The Hudson Greenway allows you to walk along the river all the way down to the George Washington Bridge.

The Cloisters

The 66.5-acre Fort Tryon Park was created by the philanthropist John D. Rockefeller, Jr. beginning in 1917, when he purchased the Billings Estate and other properties in the Fort Washington area and hired Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., son of one of the designers of Central Park, and the Olmsted Brothers firm to create a park, which he then donated to New York City in 1935. As part of the overall project, Rockefeller also bought the extensive medieval art collection of George Grey Barnard, an American sculptor and collector, who had already established a medieval-art museum near his home in Fort Washington, and gave it to the Metropolitan along with a number of pieces from Rockefeller's own collection, including the Unicorn Tapestries. These became the core of the collection now housed at the Cloisters.

The museum and adjacent gardens within Fort Tryon Park, which incorporate 4 acres, were created through grants and endowments from Rockefeller, and were built from 1934-39. Rockefeller also bought and donated several hundred acres of the New Jersey Palisades to the State of New Jersey on the other side of the Hudson River to preserve the view for the museum. This land is now part of the Palisades Interstate Park.

The museum was designed by Charles Collens who incorporated parts from five cloistered abbeys of Catalan, Occitan and French origins. Buildings from Sant Miquel de Cuixà, Sant Guilhèm dau Desèrt, Bonnefont-en-Comminges, Trie-en-Bigòrra, and Froville were disassembled stone-by-stone and shipped to New York City, where they were reconstructed and integrated by Collens into a cohesive whole by simplifying and merging the various medieval styles in his new buildings.

Go here for more information.

Fort Tryon Park

The park was an ancillary site of the American Revolutionary War Battle of Fort Washington, fought on November 16, 1776, between 2,900 American soldiers and 8,000 invading Hessian troops hired by Great Britain. Margaret Corbin became the first woman to fight in the war and was wounded during the battle. Subsequently, the southern entrance to the park bears her name. After the British victory, the outpost was named after Sir William Tryon, the last British Governor of the Province of New York.

As New York City expanded and prospered, the area was part of a country estate whose wealthy owners, included Dr. Samuel Watkins, founder of Watkins Glen, General Daniel Butterfield, Boss Tweed and C.K.G. Billings. John D. Rockefeller, Jr. purchased the Billings estate in 1917. He hired the Olmsted Brothers firm – and in particular Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., son of the designer of Central Park – to plan a park that he would give to the city. Olmsted's design capitalized on the topography to reveal sweeping vistas of the Hudson River and the Palisades.

The park's design included extensive plantings of various flora in the park's many gardens, including a Heather Garden, which was restored in the 1980s; the park's plantings were designed by James W. Dawson. Besides the gardens and the Cloisters, the park has extensive walking paths and meadows, with views of the Hudson and Harlem Rivers.

La Marina

Dyckman Marina has been a part of upper Manhattan’s unique waterfront culture for more than two centuries. In former times, notable Manhattanites kept their summer estates and yachts here, and seaplanes and ferries dotted the piers. When Jen was growing up, the site was a run-down waterfront where drug dealers plied their trade. Now, nestled just below the Cloisters at the end of Dyckman Street along the Hudson River, sits the new La Marina.The newly rebuilt restaurant, bar, lounge and events space covers more than 75,000 square feet of Hudson River waterfront in Upper Manhattan.

For more information, go here.

Where to Stay