Exciting changes are underway around the Great Lawn and the gardens surrounding the Café this spring—a redesign and garden refresh!
When the Gardens opened in 2007, what is now the Café was originally the Visitor Center. Visitors parked in the area where the pond gardens are today, entered through what’s now the Café building, and emerged onto the Great Lawn. This was the first garden visitors experienced and was designed to welcome and orient visitors while providing space to relax and host events.
Since then, the Gardens—and the Café and Great Lawn area—have evolved. By 2022, many of our gardens had matured and needed a refresh and thoughtful editing. Recognizing this, we launched a strategic garden refresh process to assess, refine, and plan for the future.
Deciding on a Refresh
This multi-year process will refresh our gardens one by one, not only editing the plantings but also rethinking the design, functionality, and features of each garden. Our goal over the next two years is to reimagine our garden spaces, not only uplifting and preserving their original design and intent, but also furthering our mission: inspiring meaningful connections between people and nature and promoting plant conservation through horticulture, education, and plant science.
What’s Planned for the Great Lawn
Pathway redesign
We have partnered with the landscape architects at Reed Hilderbrand LLC to focus on accessibility and how guests move through the garden space, while redesigning bed shapes and garden features.
One of these changes is to shift the main walking path that approaches the Café building. Instead of a direct path into the building, it will curve to the left, guiding visitors toward the Great Lawn with a new side path to enter the Café. The Café will have a new patio built, expanding outdoor seating and changing the shape of the surrounding garden beds.
New Plantings
The pathway’s reshaping allows the planting beds to be expanded and planted in a new way. Along the pathway into the Café, we’re expanding the woody plantings around the existing cultivated witch-hazels, and planning to add many woody plants and trees that are native to the Northeast area.
You can expect to see plants such as:
- White meadowsweet (Spiraea alba)
- Scarlet oak (Quercus coccinea)
- Eastern larch (Larix laricina)
- Highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum)
- Evergreen wood fern (Dryopteris intermedia)
- Wood’s sedge (Carex woodii)
On the Great Lawn, the bed that is adjacent to the Burpee Kitchen Garden will take on a new shape and expose more of Bucksport schist ledge. In the beds surrounding the Great Lawn, we’re taking advantage of the full sun conditions to showcase meadow plants. The area will be replanted with drifts of flowering perennials and grasses among the exposed ledge rock.
Expect to see some exciting new plants—some native to our local ecoregions, along with others representing upland prairies from other regions of North America. Keep an eye out for:
- early goldenrod (Solidago juncea),
- northeastern beard-tongue (Penstemon hirsutus),
- coastal plain goldentop (Euthamia caroliniana),
- stands of quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides),
- and so much more.
Timeline/ What’s Next
Construction has begun and we hope to have most of the pathway work finished by early May. However, depending on weather conditions, it may extend into our open season. During this time, some pathways may be temporarily closed. We appreciate your patience and cooperation in following temporary detours.
In the planting areas, we’ll be doing large soil remediation projects, and you can expect to see some bed shape changes. Due to plant delivery dates and required plant quarantine periods, these beds may remain bare through June. You may also notice gaps in the planting beds as we allow space for the plants to fill in, avoiding overcrowding as the plants mature.
A Renewed Space
This thoughtful redesign honors the space’s original intent while introducing fresh plantings and improving accessibility for visitors. This refresh project marks exciting changes happening at the Gardens as we grow, and we look forward to the Great Lawn continuing to be a welcoming focal point for relaxation, reflection, and community connection.
As the new plantings take root and the gardens evolve, we can’t wait for you to experience the renewed space. Follow us on Instagram for more updates as the project unfolds—and be sure to visit this summer to see the transformation firsthand!
