Perkins Center History

Moorestown Center

Perkins Memorial Buidling, a 1910 Tudor Style building in Moorestown From our early roots in Moorestown, Burlington County, Perkins Center for the Arts has become a regional arts center serving residents in southern New Jersey and beyond. Our Moorestown home is located in the Perkins Memorial, a Tudor-style manor house and carriage building surrounded by a 5-acre arboretum and situated between two county roads, the "center" of a residential neighborhood!

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, both the manor house and carriage building were designed and built in 1910 by noted Philadelphia architect, Herbert C. Wise as a wedding gift for Alice and Dudley Perkins. The buildings were bequeathed to Moorestown Township in 1965. The art center was born from the passion to save the Perkins Memorial from imminent demolition. Perkins Center for the Arts was incorporated in 1977.

Our Historic Location

During the mid-19th century, the Perkins Family ran a nursery on the property that forms a triangle between the Kings Highway and Camden Avenue. Fairview Nurseries was established sometime around 1820, and specialized in growing fruit trees, native trees, shrubs and later in their history turned to ornamental trees. The large pine trees and hemlocks that you see in the Perkins Arboretum today are believed to date from this time period.

When Dudley Perkins, a Captain in the U.S. Army married Alice Sullivan in October 1909, his father, Edward Perkins gave the property to the couple and funded the construction of the residence, which upon completion in 1910, became known as Evergreen Lawn. Not long after their marriage, Dudley was called to serve in World War I and returned with influenza from which he never recovered. Upon his death in 1918 at the age of 33, he left behind his wife Alice and son, T.H. Dudley Perkins, Jr. Alice invited her sister Mabel and husband, Francis D’Olier, to live with her and Dudley, Jr. at Evergreen Lawn.

The extended family had many years together at Evergreen Lawn. After Frank’s death in the early 1960’s, Alice’s death in 1965 and the tragic death of young Dudley, Jr. in his early 30’s, Mabel was the sole occupant in the manor home. Upon her death, the property and home were bequeathed to the Township of Moorestown to be used in perpetuity as a park or other suitable township purpose.

The Moorestown Department of Parks & Recreation made their offices in the Perkins Memorial. However, in the early 1970’s, the township was contemplating the demolition of the historic building. Responding to this situation, a group of concerned Moorestown citizens including Sally Harrall, Jean Gasch, Frank Keenan and Louis Matlack fought to save the Perkins Memorial and had the buildings listed on the National and State Registers of Historic Places in 1975. The township’s Recreational Advisory Committee recommended that the building be retained for use as a self-sustaining cultural arts center. Perkins Center for the Arts was created and opened its doors in 1976 and was officially incorporated in 1977 as a non-profit community arts center serving the residents of Moorestown and the entire southern New Jersey region. Perkins Center is currently operating under its second 25-year lease with the Township of Moorestown.   The maintenance and upkeep of this historic site is soley dependent on pulic support and tax deductible donations.

Collingswood Center

In 2002, Perkins Center expanded to a satellite facility in Collingswood, Camden County. Plans are underway to fully renovate the building to include quality art studios, classrooms and exhibition spaces within an environmentally sensitive "green building." Working in partnership with the Borough of Collingswood, this expansion allows us to develop new programs in the visual, performing and literary arts, reach new audiences, and maintain the warm and intimate atmosphere of a community arts center.