Please join us on Thursday, June 5, 2025 at 6 p.m., as we present the 2025 ANNE BRUCE HALDEMAN AWARD FOR KENTUCKY LANDSCAPES, PRESERVATION, AND HISTORY to Walter T. Crutcher. The evening will feature exquisite flowers, live music, delicious food & libations, and a bottle pull. Proceeds support the ongoing preservation and educational mission of Farmington.

In the nineteenth century, Farmington, home to the John and Lucy Speed family and as many as 70 enslaved individuals, was an important component of Kentucky’s plantation system of agriculture. Historic Homes Foundation formed in 1957 to save Farmington and opened the main house to the public as Louisville’s first historic house museum in 1959. 

Anne Bruce Haldeman, native daughter of Louisville, was a landscape architect, preservationist, and an inspiration to gardeners throughout the state. Ms. Haldeman graduated from the  Cambridge School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture in 1931, Haldeman, along with her classmate and partner Louise Leland (1902-1956), returned to Louisville in 1934 and founded the landscape architectural firm of Haldeman & Leland. While Anne Bruce Haldeman designed numerous gardens and landscapes throughout the region, she is best remembered for her role in the historically-informed gardens at My Old Kentucky Home State Park in Bardstown, Farmington Historic Plantation in Louisville, and as a consultant for Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill in Mercer County.

Haldeman was a member of the group who spearheaded the movement to rescue the historically significant home and gardens of Farmington, helping to found the Historic Homes Foundation Inc., a local organization created to protect the integrity of historic homes. Throughout the late 1960s and 70s, Haldeman researched the Speed family, the home, as well as the time period, to create as historically accurate gardens as possible. For example, understanding the importance of gardens, both edible and decorative to Kentucky’s planter elite, Haldeman installed the federal style garden adjacent to tonight’s dinner venue. Tickets and Sponsorships are now available to purchase. Details on sponsorships are available here: Evening In the Garden 2025 Sponsorship Options If you have questions, please contact Michael@historichomes.org.