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The New Botanical Center
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Flash--Work on the new Springfield-Greene County Botanical Center is virtually complete, thanks to the R.E. Smith Construction Co. of Joplin, Missouri. THE BIG NEWS: The Center will hold its Grand Opening the week of October 11-17.
Welcome to a special page about the $4.3 million Botanical Center now being built in Springfield, Missouri's Nathanael Greene/Close Memorial Park. What this building will do for the already lively gardening world in the Ozarks is a marvelous story, and we'll be keeping you posted here.
This page is our own informal view of the Center, along with some notes and quotes from others excited about the project.
Guess who's an especially important figure in the Botanical Center project. You are. It's no joke. You can help the Center and the Botanical Gardens around it tremendously just by telling people about them.
You can also, if you like, contribute financially to help build an endowment fund to support the Gardens, a gift that will benefit all of us today and our children, grandchildren, and many generations to come.
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Enlarge photo | | Big News for a Lively Gardening Region
This young woman is the new Coordinator for the Springfield-Greene County Botanical Center. Her name is Katie Steinhoff. She's a horticulturist, a landscape designer, and outdoorsperson, and, well, you can read her colorful bio here.
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Enlarge photo | | Just What Is a Botanical Center, Anyway?
It's simple. A botanical center is a place where people can learn about plant life. A botanical center can provide classes, workshops, and demonstrations in identifying, growing, and caring for plants of all kinds. It includes botanical gardens that are essentially teaching gardens where people can see first-hand plants that grow well in their region, how to grow them, and how they can be used to beautify one's own surroundings. But there's more, as you'll see.
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Enlarge photo | | A $3 Million Vote of Confidence
Voters in 2006 approved a 1/4-cent sales tax to provide $3 million to build the Botanical Center. We're careful with public money in the Ozarks, but the vote wasn't all that surprising, considering that we're also one of America's liveliest gardening regions. In fact, Springfield has been ranked third in the nation in per capita spending on gardening.* Our region truly deserves a Botanical Center and now, we're getting one.
*(Source: The 2005 Missouri University Extension Annual Report.)
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Enlarge photo | | THE GARDENS
For many, the most exciting feature of the Botanical Center is its Botanical Gardens. The Center in time will be surrounded by 45 Botanical Gardens, and twenty-four of these gardens already exist for visitors to enjoy today. You can see many of them on this website via the Real Gardens page, or these individual links: the Hosta Garden, the English Garden, the Ornamental Grass Garden, the Iris Garden, the Lily Garden, the Butterfly Garden, the Rose Garden, the White Garden, the Columbine Garden, the Flowering Shrub Garden, the Daylily Garden, the Wildflower Garden, the Master Gardeners Demonstration Garden, and the Mizumoto Japanese Stroll Garden
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Enlarge photo | | FUNDING THE GARDENS
Sales taxes, grants, and private donations successfully funded the Center's construction. Now the job is to build an endowment fund for the creation and maintenance of the botanical gardens, All gifts are tax deductible and may be made by sending a check (with "Friends of the Garden Growth & Maintenance Fund" on the memo line) to the Community foundation of the Ozarks, 425 E. Trafficway, Springfield, MO 65806.
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Enlarge photo | | When Will the Botanical Center Open?
The "best guess" is September of this year. No official announcement to that effect has been made, but all involved are keeping their fingers crossed.
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Enlarge photo | | Where is the Center Located?
The setting for the Botanical Center is two beautiful adjoining parks, the 59-acre Nathanael Greene Park and the 55-acre Close Memorial Park. The parks share a common entrance at 2400 S. Scenic in Springfield, Missouri, and are often called Nathanael Greene/Close Memorial Park. Amazingly, many people still aren't aware of the park complex, one of our greatest environmental assets. We'll tell you more about the parks below, but for now...
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Enlarge photo | | The Building
This artist's rendering shows the 12,768-square-foot building and its 125-foot glass facade, which H Design Group, the Center architects, say will let in maximum natural light and allow a sense of the interior and exterior environments flowing together. By using energy-efficient mechanical and lighting materials and systems, the Center will also be a "green building."
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Enlarge photo | | Overhead View
This expanded overhead view of the Center shows the elevated plaza, the parking area, the service drive, the outdoor plaza space below, a special garden area, the entrance drive, and Lake Drummond.
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Enlarge photo | | A Rooftop Plaza
Built against a hillside to blend into the landscape, the Center's rooftop plaza provides an open vista and a 6,000-square-foot terrace for a rooftop garden and outdoor events, meetings, and classes. Visitors will enter the main building through the structure at the right rear, where horizontal lines represent a screen planted with vines to provide a green entryway. Cable or glass railing will allow maximum visibility.
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Enlarge photo | | Overhead Detail
A closer view of the Center from overhead shows more elevated plaza detail, the building entry colonnade, the roof planter, and the outdoor plaza area below.
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Enlarge photo | | The Lobby
From the rooftop plaza, visitors will descend by stairs or an elevator into a large, open, airy lobby with a reception desk, exhibit space, and access to offices, meeting rooms and classrooms. The south-facing lobby will receive the maximum natural light.
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Enlarge photo | | Interior Detail
This cutaway view of the Center's interior shows its rooms and their uses.
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Enlarge photo | | What Will Be Inside the Building?
The Botanical Center will house offices for the Springfield- Greene County Parks Department, University of Missouri Greene County Extension and its Master Gardeners, 4-H, and other programs; and Friends of the Garden. It will also contain a giftshop/bookstore, a library, and classroom, meeting space, and exhibit space that will make possible many programs, seminars, and demonstrations previously unrealized for lack of a location.
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Enlarge photo | | Who are the Friends of the Garden?
Friends of the Garden is a nonprofit organization of volunteers. It was formed in 1998 for the purposes of establishing and maintaining botanical gardens in Close Memorial Park and raising tax-deductible donations to help fund the Botanical Center construction. Its members represent many different backgrounds, professions, livelihoods, and life experiences, all united in the mission to build the Center.
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Enlarge photo | | Can I Join Friends of the Garden?
Sure. Joining Friends of the Garden is easy. A $25 donation will help build the Center and buy a Friends membership. The membership includes a free season pass for two to the Mizumoto Japanese Stroll Garden, discounts on gardening seminars and workshops, and participation in a great gardening community. If you like, you can download a membership form here. Again, any donation to the Botanical Center project--in any amount--is tax-deductible.
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Enlarge photo | | More About Close Memorial Park
People are more and more discovering Close Memorial Park and its amenities. This bronze sculpture, for example, touches nearly everyone who encounters it. It's of a beloved civic leader, Anne Drummond, shown reading by the lake that came to bear her name. Other attractions include vast open spaces, scenic walkways, a playground, bronzes of children at play, 21 beautiful botanical gardens, an Arboretum containing most of Missouri's native trees, a section of the Ozark Greenways Trail, a concourse, picnic tables, and grills. It all forms a wonderful setting for the Botanical Center, which will emerge from a park hillside and also overlook Lake Drummond.
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Enlarge photo | | More About Nathanael Greene Park
Named for American Revolutionary War General Nathanael Greene, said to be George Washington's most trusted officer, this park has some wonderful features: the 1850's-era Gray-Campbell Farmstead, where visitors can see how our first settlers actually lived; the Master Gardeners Demonstration Garden, a great teaching garden; the Mizumoto Japanese Stroll Garden; a colorful cottage garden created by the Federated Garden Clubs of Southwest Missouri; a turf garden; the Lions Club History Walk; decorative statuary; scenic walkways; two rentable pavilions; picnic areas; and wide open spaces. It's a marvel on its own, and with Close Park is virtually a garden oasis.
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Enlarge photo | | Keeping Current Online
For up-to-date information on the Botanical Center project, beautiful photos of the botanical gardens, and important links, Friends of the Garden has a winner of a website here.
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Enlarge photo | | Another Essential Website
University of Missouri Extension-Greene County also raised funds for the Botanical Center and Civic Communications Specialist David Burton has created an excellent summary of the project, including up-to-date figures, key links, and other important info here.
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Enlarge photo | | 'A Great Shot in the Arm....'
The Botanical Center will be "a great shot in the arm to the Master Gardeners program," said Gaylord Moore, who recently retired as Missouri University Extension horticultural specialist. He adds that the Center will guarantee the program a location for classes and workshops and the gardens will serve to demonstrate soil conditioning, how to divide perennials, and "everything that has to do with plants, fruits, vegetables, trees, shrubs--you name it."
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Enlarge photo | | 'The Public Wants It. We Want It.'
We don't have near the space here to list Jodie Adams' achievements as the Springfield-Greene County Park Board's parks and recreation director. We can note her role in the city's receiving the National Recreation and Park Association's Gold Medal for Excellence in Parks and Recreation Management in 2000. We can also note her election in 2008 as the president of the NRPA. The Park Board will own, operate, and maintain the Botanical Center, about which Jodie says with a smile, "The public wants it. We want it."
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Enlarge photo | | 'We are all stewards of the earth....'
"We are all stewards of the earth, and our children can be led into this path through the Center's classes and programs." They're the most telling words yet on the Botanical Center project, and they come from Susan Boswell, a mother of four who obviously cares about the world today and the world to come. As Friends of the Garden development director, Susan works tirelessly in leading the public drive for funds.
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Enlarge photo | | 'It will be a place the city will be proud of'
So said Paul Redfearn, former Friends of the Garden president, professor emeritus of botany at Missouri State University, and former mayor of Springfield. Paul makes many contributions to the Botanical Center project, including providing beautiful pictures of the botanical gardens now present in Close Park. You can see many of them here.
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Enlarge photo | | Getting the Word Out
Marketing veteran George Deatz, newly elected president of Friends of the Garden, is also the group's publicity chairman. As such, he has an especially big task--getting the word out about the Botanical Center and all of the benefits it will provide our region. George emphasizes that "everyone should visit the site of the new Botanical Center now and see the current botanical wonders these parks have to offer."
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Enlarge photo | | 'A Great Opportunity...'
Bob Kipfer, the Friends of the Garden vice-president, is an avid conservationist. A retired M.D. and vice-president in the Missouri Master Naturalist program of the Department of Conservation and University of Missouri Extension, Bob believes that a botanical center is a "necessity in any major metropolitan center." He's especially committed to the center's Arboretum as "a great opportunity to have the most complete collection of Missouri's native trees."
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Enlarge photo | | 'That tree? Well, that's a...well, er, uh....'
For those who would like once and for all to be able to identify Missouri's trees, the Center project has some major help. The Arboretum already contains most of the state's native trees, and more will be planted this year. Bob Kipfer and George Deatz have prepared a map of Close Park that shows the trees' exact locations, and it even includes GPS coordinates. Extra good news: The map will be made available to the public free of charge.
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Enlarge photo | | 'An Excellent Source...'
As Friends of the Garden garden chairman, Bob Childress helps plan the botanical gardens, obtains plants, and does the physical work of helping plant and maintain them. Given all that, we take him seriously when he says that the Botanical Center will be "an excellent source of information for people who are looking for ideas for landscaping and gardening."
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Enlarge photo | | A Generous Gift to Close Memorial Park
Bravo to the Botany Shop Garden Center in Joplin, Missouri, for donating dozens of beautiful shrubs and trees to Close Memorial Park in Springfield--hydrangea varieties like 'Endless Summer,' 'Blue Moon' wisteria, 'Fantasy' crape myrtle, and more, and redbud, maple, holly, elm, and other trees. Owner Mike Shade grows thousands of trees and shrubs, we're told, specializing in red maples and selling all over the nation. The Shop's website has more info here.
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Enlarge photo | | 'We Are Excited About This New Building'
David Burton is more than busy writing and disseminating important news as the University of Missouri-Greene County Extension civic communications specialist. For the Botanical Center, however, he's gone the extra mile beyond his regular duties, taking a key role in the extension drive for Center funds and many supporting tasks, even to the point of hand-delivering fundraising brochures throughout the region.
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Enlarge photo | | A Gift in Memory
A beautiful way to honor loved ones and support the Botanical Center is to purchase a brick in the Memorial Walk in the English White Garden in Close Memorial Park. The bricks may be purchased for a $50 donation mailed with the desired inscription to Friends of the Garden, P.O. Box 8566, Springfield, MO 65801. Any questions can be directed to Bob Childress, Garden Chairman, 417-838-9454
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