Where Poetry Took Root: Elizabeth Bishop’s Key West Home and Garden
FLORIDA KEYS VIDEO ADVISORY November 14, 2025
Contacts: Chad Newman, Chad@fla-keys.com (310) 283-8441 or Mary B. Haban, Mary@fla-keys.com (305) 394-3142
Story: Where Poetry Took Root: Elizabeth Bishop’s Key West Home and Garden
Locator: Key West, Fla.
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Video: Exterior, interior and garden views of the Elizabeth Bishop House at 624 White Street in Key West, Fla., with sound bites from Arlo Haskell, executive director of Key West Literary Seminar.
Technical Data:
TRT: 2:42
Filename: ElizabethBishopHouse.mp4
Audio: Stereo Mix
SOTs: Clean / Isolated
B-Roll: Nat. Sound
Credit: Florida Keys News Bureau (Screen credit appreciated, not mandatory)
Where Poetry Took Root: Elizabeth Bishop’s Key West Home and Garden
KEY WEST, Fla. (November 14, 2025) — When Elizabeth Bishop’s former home came on the market in 2019, Key West Literary Seminar saw a chance to preserve a piece of the island’s literary history. The white house at 624 White Street had been the poet’s home for eight years, a place where her writing took shape.
Bishop (1911–1979) was an American poet who won the 1956 Pulitzer Prize for poetry. She lived at the late-19th-century eyebrow house from 1938 to 1946, writing many of the poems that appeared in her first collection, North & South, published in 1946.
“When in 2019, this house where she had lived in, in the 1930s and 40s, where she had written most of her first book, North and South, where she had chronicled this amazing, you know, historic period in Key West, when this house came on the market, we just felt like we had to do this,” said Arlo Haskell, executive director of Key West Literary Seminar.
“We had to, we had to save this house. We had to make sure that this house was going to be preserved in its historic condition, that it would go on to, to tell the story, not just of Bishop in Key West, but also of this broader literary history that she’s a part of.”
The seminar’s connection to Bishop reaches back to 1993, when its annual gathering focused on her work. Poets, scholars and her editor, Robert Giroux, came together to explore her poetry and letters. Her paintings went on public display, and the White Street house received its Literary Landmark designation.
More than 25 years later, the seminar acquired the property and began restoring it to the period of Bishop’s residence. The work included the windows, louvered shutters, porches and colors she described in her writing.
Today, the restored house serves as the seminar’s headquarters and hosts scheduled exhibitions, tours and literary events. Outside, the Bishop Garden gives visitors another way into her work. Plants drawn from her letters, notebooks and poems grow along paths and around places to sit and read, connecting her observations to the island landscape.
“There’s about 50 different native species that we have growing out here in the garden, or some of, you know, the great tropical fruit trees that we all love down here: mango, soursop, sugar apple, avocado,” Haskell said.
“These things that are important part of Key West culinary tradition, important part of culture of Key West, and so in the garden, you’ll be able to plug in to that experience and see these plants through Bishop’s eyes.”
The garden is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The house opens for scheduled programs.
For more information, visit KWLS.org.
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Elizabeth Bishop stands beside a bicycle in Key West, Fla., around 1937. The future Pulitzer Prize-winning poet bought a home on White Street in 1938 and lived there until 1946, writing many of the poems that appeared in her first collection, North & South. Key West Literary Seminar later acquired and restored the house. (Courtesy Key West Literary Seminar)
Poet Elizabeth Bishop wears a straw hat in this historical photograph from her years in Key West, Fla. Bishop, who won the 1956 Pulitzer Prize for poetry, lived at a White Street home from 1938 to 1946. The restored house and its garden now serve as Key West Literary Seminar’s headquarters and a setting for exhibitions, tours and literary events. (Courtesy Key West Literary Seminar)
The restored Elizabeth Bishop House on White Street in Key West, Fla., offers a glimpse into the home where the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet lived from 1938 to 1946. Bishop wrote many of the poems in her first collection, North & South, during her years here. Key West Literary Seminar acquired the property in 2019 and restored it to the period of her residence, preserving the home as part of the island’s literary heritage. (Mark Hedden/Florida Keys News Bureau)
An interior view of the Elizabeth Bishop House on White Street in Key West, Fla., shows the restored home where the poet lived and wrote from 1938 to 1946. Preserved by Key West Literary Seminar, the house connects visitors with Bishop’s life and the island’s broader literary history. It now serves as the seminar’s headquarters, with interior access during scheduled tours and literary events. (Mark Hedden/Florida Keys News Bureau)