Help Us Build This Garden Pavilion!

Thanks to an extraordinarily generous challenge grant from the prestigious Gerry Charitable Trust, the Jay Estate is building a beautiful pavilion based on a 19th-century design at the head of our new Historic Jay Gardens.

But we need your help!

The Gerry Charitable Trust has awarded JHC a $50,000 grant–and if we can raise another $75,000 by March 2020, they’ll match every dollar. We’re almost there. Thanks to your generosity, we have already raised $56,000. But we need to raise another $19,000 by March 2020 to take full advantage of the challenge grant.

Will you help us reach our goal? Donate here.

In 1849 the Jay Family built a charming Gothic Revival cottage on Cherry Hill, beside the Jay Mansion, based on a design by renowned architect Alexander Jackson Davis, who also designed Whitby Castle and Lyndhurst. The cottage closely resembled Station No. 10, an A.J. Davis-designed structure at New York Yacht Club (click here to learn more about this iconic institution that John Clarkson Jay helped found).

Time, rotting wood, and carpenter bees eventually took their toll on the 19th-century cottage. But with your help and that of the Gerry Charitable Trust, we are making plans to construct a new outdoor classroom on Cherry Hill — a functional learning space that will make visual reference to the historic cottage that preceded it.

If you would like to make a matching donation towards the new pavilion, please mail your check to:

Jay Heritage Center/ Gerry Charitable Trust Challenge Grant,
210 Boston Post Road, Rye, NY 10580

or contact us at jayheritagecenter@gmail.com to find out how to make a gift online.