Lichgate on High Road, Tudor cottage in Tallahassee, United States.
Lichgate is a small Tudor-style cottage modelled on the Earl Gresh Wood Parade Museum in St. Petersburg, with a steep roof cut away over the doors and windows to suggest a thatched cottage and a tall chimney topped by a chimney pot. It stands at 1401 High Road beside a large live oak.
Laura Jepsen, a comparative literature professor at Florida State University from 1946 to 1978, bought the High Road property in 1955 from representatives of the Capital City Free Will Baptist Church; the sale carried covenants barring development for 25 years. She modelled her cottage on the Tudor-style Earl Gresh Wood Parade Museum in St. Petersburg. After her death on Christmas Eve 1995, the property passed to The Nature Conservancy, and the Laura Jepsen Institute Inc. took over its care by August 1997. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on March 31, 2006.
The house reflects English medieval church traditions through its architectural details and garden design. Walking around the property, you encounter plants connected to Shakespeare's works and a meditation labyrinth that invites contemplation.
The property is at 1401 High Road and is open to the public and small groups. The grounds are compact, so visitors can walk through the gardens and around the cottage on foot. The site is cared for by the Laura Jepsen Institute Inc.
The cottage was modelled on the Earl Gresh Wood Parade Museum in St. Petersburg, a Tudor-style building Jepsen had seen and described in her book Lichgate on High Road. She wrote that it occurred to her a small house might be moved from St. Petersburg to a site in Tallahassee.
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