 Incidentally, the same species of tree, which also is quite abundant in the state park to the south, was among the reasons for the land in the immediate vicinity of the house being designated as a state park in the 1960s.Due to disease and old age, the tree died in the early 2000s and subsequently, was removed, as most of the trunk of the tree remained and was being held in place through cables and bracing.The house's close proximity to the tree, some ten feet, led to a feeling of oneness with nature, which was integral to the design aesthetic that Mies sought in designing the house.