This 42-Acre New Jersey Estate With Decades-Old Gardens Asks $3.2M

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At Dove Island, the garden isn’t simply a backdrop. The historic Stillwater, NJ, estate now asking $3.295 million, spans more than 40 acres shaped over decades by one family.

When the family took stewardship of Dove Island in the late 1960s, the property encompassed about 18 acres. As they acquired surrounding land, the wife’s passion for gardening transformed the grounds while the husband added character with collected objects and sculpture.

“What makes the gardens at Dove Island so special is that…the landscape we experience today is really the vision and life’s work of one family,” says Sophia De Senzo with Keller Williams Integrity.

That vision unfolds gradually. More formal plantings near the house transition into orchards, woodland paths, greenhouses and wilder stretches of landscape, where stone arches and statuary appear among the greenery. At the far end, a waterfall designed by the homeowner drops roughly 60 feet through the woods toward a lake.

The house has a similarly collected character. What began as an 1890 farmhouse has evolved into an approximately 10,000-square-foot residence. A soaring great room gathers around a massive stone fireplace, while intricate warm wood paneling and built-ins create more intimate spaces. A 19th-century walnut-paneled Wall Street boardroom was even dismantled and reconstructed inside the house. Brighter, window-lined spaces keep the surrounding greenery close.

“The next owner isn’t being handed an empty canvas,” De Senzo says. “They are being entrusted with a living landscape that has already spent decades growing into itself.”

Dove Island is listed with Tolga “Tony” Erzene of Keller Williams Integrity.