The Garden
Le Petit Versailles is a vibrant community garden, performance space, music venue and public forum for workshops, screenings and exhibitions. It is Allied’s primary program and a focal point for participants enhancing the public spaces of our neighborhood, Manhattan’s Lower East Side. The garden has an active performance and exhibit schedule during the summer months. LPV is an NYC Parks GreenThumb garden.
History
Le Petit Versailles occupies a 20’ by 60’ lot that was formerly the site of an auto body “chop shop”. In 1996, Peter Cramer and Jack Waters began developing the site into a garden. With years of work they created a lush open space dominated by a stage that fulfills their comittment to providing a place for performers, filmmakers, and visual artists to show their work. Since its founding, Le Petit Versailles has been home to countless art exhibitions, performances, readings, film screenings, and more.
Before: View of the lot from East Second Street.
After: The East Second Street entrance to the garden. Photo by George Hirose
Today the garden can be accessed from both Houston and East Second Streets. Entering from Houston, a narrow brick path slopes down and splits to circle the low wooden platform that serves as the stage. Narrow beds filled with shrubs, perennials, vines, and annuals border the walls of the adjacent buildings. The path continues through an arbor-covered seating area, to the gate on Second Street.
The Allied Project Archive encompasses a record of all past goings-on at Le Petit Versailles. To browse the archive, click here.
“One of the nice things that happened when we first started the garden was someone threw a note over the fence and the note said, ‘I’ve been living here a number of years and seen this blossom.’ I don’t remember the exact words, but just that they really appreciated that someone was taking the trouble.
— PETER CRAMER
Giving to the garden
We are always accepting donations to support Le Petit Versailles and help Allied Productions maintain the garden as a beloved gathering spot and valuable cultural resource.
Click here to donate using Paypal.
Le Petit Versailles events are made possible by Allied Productions, Inc., Gardeners & Friends of LPV, NYC Parks GreenThumb, Materials for the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, and the Office of City Councilwoman Carlina Rivera. Exhibitions are made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature.