Swan Woods

On the campus of the sprawling Atlanta History Center lies Swan House, a Palladian mansion and estate which has been the home of the Atlanta Historical Society since 1967. Surrounding this landmark is ten acres of green robust forest in the heart of the city. In the mid-to-late nineteenth century this land had been cleared for cotton cultivation. When farming was abandoned in the area, Swan Woods began to return to its original forested state.

In 1969, Peachtree Garden Club won the Founders Fund Award to develop an outdoor laboratory of walking paths and a self-guided educational brochure taking visitors to 15 stations illustrating the ecosystem. Towering pine, beech and tulip trees lie alongside a collection of fern species, wildflowers and groundcover plants native to the area. Now a mature succession forest, Swan Woods is an important oasis welcoming thousands of school children each year through a cooperative initiative with the Atlanta Public School system.

The Swan Woods Foundation now oversees preservation and maintenance projects and Peachtree Garden Club members are actively involved. Recently, members collaborated with the Atlanta Botanical Garden to conserve endangered trillium and worked to propagate and reintroduce these rare and endangered wildflowers. In 2013, Peachtree GC gifted a pristine 1830’s hand hewn log cabin to serve as a new teaching venue which will be used by Atlanta’s school children for many generations to come