Historic mountaintop estate featuring a neoclassical residence, gardens, and preserved plantation landscape designed as a lifelong architectural project and interpreted through guided tours and exhibitions.
General Information
Hours vary seasonally and may change for holidays
Advance ticket reservations are recommended
Youth (12–18): $18
Children 11 and under: Free
How to Get There
From Charlottesville, VA (3 mi): Take US‑20 S, turn left onto VA‑53 E (Thomas Jefferson Parkway), then follow signs to Monticello Loop and continue to the visitor center parking area.
Overview
Monticello was Thomas Jefferson's plantation and home just outside Charlottesville, which he began designing at age 26. Jefferson's neoclassical, Palladio-inspired house crowns an 850-foot hilltop ("little mountain" in Italian), and he reworked it for decades. It is a National Historic Landmark and, together with the University of Virginia, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and it appears on the back of the U.S. nickel.
The 5,000-acre plantation relied on the labor of enslaved people, and tours cover their lives along Mulberry Row, the lane of workshops and quarters. After Jefferson's death in 1826 the property was sold, then preserved by Commodore Uriah P. Levy and his nephew before the Thomas Jefferson Foundation bought it in 1923.
What to See
- The house: Jefferson's inventive design and collections
- Mulberry Row: a nailery, workshops, and quarters of enslaved workers
- Gardens: flower and vegetable gardens and Jefferson's plant experiments
- Monticello Cemetery: Jefferson's burial place
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article "Monticello", which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0
