Mariemont: A Philanthropist's Model Town

Mariemont, just east of Cincinnati, was not built by a developer. It was built by a widow with a vision and seven million dollars. Mary Emery, a Cincinnati philanthropist, spent more than fifteen years assembling land and planning a community where people of all income levels could live side by side in well-designed, decently priced homes.

She broke ground on April twenty-third, nineteen twenty-three, hiring the eminent town planner John Nolen and twenty-five leading American architects to realize what they called a national exemplar of modern city planning. The result was a walkable village of English-influenced cottages, small shops, and shared green spaces laid out according to the principles of the Garden City movement that had originated in Britain. Mariemont was designated a National Historic Landmark in two thousand seven, recognized as one of the finest examples of planned community design in the United States.

It looks much the same today as it did a hundred years ago.