William Paca House and Garden

Beautiful house and beautiful garden. Lovely place to stroll. Lots of events and frequently hosts weddings. The garden is manicured daily by a dedicated staff. Maryland has many beautiful Historic Buildings but few are as nice to visit. Park in the public garages on Main Street and walk over. It’s about 4 shortish blocks away. Near the Naval Academy Gates 1 & 2. Down the street from St John’s College. One block away from Maryland Avenue shopping and dining. One block from the Maryland State House.
I’ve seen 50% off coupons on their social media listings if you check in.

Had my wedding and reception here in September 2013. Besides price, they win hands down on multiple fronts. The venue coordinator, Jodie Dalton, is born for weddings. She gushes about the couple, asks questions, tries to take stress away from the couple, coordinates with vendors, offers suggestions, has plans B/​C/​D already in place before you think of it, and is so incredibly sweet. The venue is gorgeous and the price is comparable for other such places (plus tent included!). But Jodie is why we came back after checking out other garden venues. The gardens are so pretty and taking a glass of wine for a stroll during the reception, so perfect for our guests. It was an amazing venue and a great day.
We are incredibly grateful to the William Paca House, staff, and especially Jodie for making our day so special.

Husband and I toured the William Paca (logically pronounced «pay-​ka») Garden on a beautiful weekend afternoon in Annapolis. Paca was one of the signatories to the Declaration of Independence and served as Maryland’s Governor from 1782 — 1785.
The house and gardens were built between 1763 and 1765. Having spent four years in Williamsburg in college, however, I’ve toured my fair share of 18^th century structures so I figured we could forgo the $ 10 house tour and just pay $ 7 to see the gardens. The garden stretches out behind the Paca House, terraced and parterred. Unfortunately, on our visit the rose parterre was still dormant, but the boxwood topiary were lovely and the vegetable garden was exploding. A fish-​shaped pond with arched footbridge leads to the tower-​like «summer house» where the Paca family enjoyed meals and leisure time in particularly hot weather. These lie at the shaded back of the gardens, closest to breezes blowing in from the Bay.
I’m not sure the gardens alone are worth the $ 7 entry fee since you can easily see everything in under 30 minutes (although if you were so inclined, you could probably bring along some reading material and pass hours here on a nice day). But the volunteers who were working on the afternoon of our visit were very helpful and clearly well-​versed in the history of the home and the man behind it. So if you’re *not* OD’ed on Colonial dwellings, it’s probably worth the time and money to tour the home as well.