he 1920 Tudor Revival Groesbeck House was modeled on the English Estate of Munstead Wood, the home of famous garden designer Gertrude Jekyll. The elegant home and garden thrived through the decades, but was converted in 1957 to Camp Wildwood, a children’s summer camp and adult conference center. The property was acquired in 2004 and the Cincinnati Nature Center shuttered the house. However; when they searched for a home for their newly conceived conservation center in 2012, they found the perfect location right in their own backyard. An extensive historic rehabilitation was needed to convert the 7,800 square foot house into an energy efficient, ADA accessible, historicallysensitive home to the new Center for Conservation. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2015, the rehabilitation was completed under budget at $2.3 million and opened in 2017. The all-native Ohio landscaping, consisting of 10,000 plants, was completed in May 2018.
The award was presented to the Cincinnati Nature Center.