Blithewold Mansion, Gardens and Arboretum is a historic Bristol, Rhode Island, estate overlooking Bristol Harbor and Narragansett Bay, developed in the 1890s as the summer retreat of Augustus and Bessie Van Wickle. After the original 1895 Queen Anne mansion burned, the house was rebuilt in 1906 in an English Country Manor style and remained in family hands until it passed to the Heritage Foundation of Rhode Island. Open to the public since 1978, the restored house museum preserves family furnishings and collections. Its 32-acre grounds, shaped largely between 1896 and 1913, are also significant for extensive gardens, an arboretum with hundreds of woody plant species, and notable specimen trees.

Bristol, Rhode Island · USA