New photos of President Donald Trump’s promised makeover of the White House Rose Garden show the area as never seen before.
Images taken Friday showed the garden’s vast lawn covered in gravel as workers continued the renovation that began earlier this month. Trump had
previously vowed
to pave over the Rose Garden, bemoaning the dampness of the grass and saying the soft ground made it difficult for women to walk in high heels.
The changes to the garden, which is frequently used for White House press events, are a dramatic sequel to those spearheaded by first lady Melania Trump during her husband’s first term.
Melania Trump’s
widely criticized
2020 renovation involved removing a large portion of the garden’s vegetation — including its
beloved crab apple trees
— and planting new rose bushes.
The Rose Garden
was first established
in 1903 for first lady Edith Roosevelt. In 1962, celebrated gardener Rachel Lambert “Bunny” Mellon oversaw a major redesign of the space for President John F. Kennedy.
Prior to the 2020 overhaul, other administrations had made
only minor tweaks
to the garden since the Kennedy era.
