By Carol Stocker
Garrison, NY: Jenny Young du Pont will become President and Chief Executive Officer of the Garden Conservancy on April 8, Benjamin F. Lenhardt, Jr., Chairman of the Board, announced today.
Mr. Lenhardt added, “We enthusiastically welcome Jenny to the Garden Conservancy. The Board of Directors has great confidence in her ability to move the organization forward as we implement the pillars of our ambitious new strategic plan: save, share, educate, and advocate. She brings proven talents, varied skills, and an impressive resume as the executive director of Miracle House of New York, an attorney in the U.S. and London, and a leader on philanthropic and nonprofit boards.”
Ms. du Pont said, “I’m delighted about this opportunity to work with the Garden Conservancy and to build on its twenty-three years of accomplishments. It’s an exciting time for the organization to expand its garden preservation and education programs, including Open Days. I look forward to working with the Garden Conservancy’s board, staff, Fellows, members, and volunteers, as well as with organizations and gardens in communities across the country.”
Since 2010, Ms. du Pont has been a legal and strategic consultant advising clients on business development, marketing, legal issues, and investor relations. Her clients have included various media, technology, and financial firms.
From 2007 to 2009, she served as Executive Director of Miracle House of New York, Inc., a nonprofit social services agency in New York City. Previously, she was an in-house attorney for Plymouth Rock Assurance Corporation in Boston, MA, and practiced law at Covington Burling and Sidley Austin in Washington, D.C. and London, England.
Ms. du Pont also has an extensive record of philanthropic work. A former Trustee of Phillips Exeter Academy, she has also served as a Director and Overseer for the Conservation Law Foundation in Boston, and an Overseer for Hancock Shaker Village in Hancock, MA. She is currently president of the Exeter Association of Greater New York, a class officer and fundraiser for her class at Princeton, and a Director and Secretary of the American Friends of the British Museum. She earned a joint JD/MSFS degree, magna cum laude, from Georgetown University Law Center and the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, an AB in History cum laude from Princeton University, and graduated with high honors from Phillips Exeter Academy.
She lives with her husband and their four children in Tarrytown, New York.
About the Garden Conservancy
Since its founding in 1989 by renowned plantsman Frank Cabot, the Garden Conservancy has done more than any other national institution to save and preserve America’s exceptional gardens for the education and enjoyment of the public. Five of the gardens with which the Garden Conservancy is working are National Historic Landmarks and seventeen are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 1995, the Garden Conservancy launched a national garden-visiting program, Open Days, through which more than 300 private gardens now open their gates to thousands of visitors every year. The Conservancy also presents lectures and symposia in a number of regional centers to provide its members, horticulturists, landscape professionals, and the public a source of contemporary ideas relevant to gardening, design, and preservation.
Major support for the Conservancy comes from its more than 4,000 members, including more than 300 patrons in the Conservancy’s Society of Fellows. In 2010, the Conservancy successfully completed a $15 million Campaign to Save America’s Exceptional Gardens, establishing an endowment fund to provide permanent support for the organization’s mission.
In April 2012, the Garden Conservancy received the prestigious Historic Preservation Medal from the Garden Club of America “in recognition of outstanding work in the field of preservation and/or restoration of historic gardens or buildings of national importance.” In 2009, the Conservancy received the Organizational Excellence Award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
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