Heritage Museums & Gardens is a premiere public garden featuring a 100-acre property located in historic Sandwich Village, Massachusetts. Heritage boasts beautifully landscaped gardens, an extensive network of nature trails, and special exhibits in the museum galleries.
The entrance to this historic property has recently been redesigned to create a green parking area, offering a more beautiful entrance for visitors and much-needed stormwater infrastructure.
There is a growing interest in green parking lots that reduce environmental impact, improve safety, while being designed with appealing aesthetics in the process. The Heritage Museum & Gardens project is an excellent example of this multi-functional approach.
To the Heritage visitor, it looks like a more colorful entrance with better pick-up and drop-off access. But beyond the lovely view, there is a highly functioning stormwater management system where rainwater is directed to the landscaped bioretention system. The series of bioretention basins collect and treat the runoff but are viewed simply as lovely gardens to visitors. The parking lot project boasts over 8,000 perennials, 350 flowering shrubs, and 50 specimen trees. The project also incorporated permeable hardscape features including decorative pavers, native boulder walls, and a wave-model sidewalk grate.
From the beginning, the project has maintained a strong focus on landscape design, enhancing the visitor’s experience with a beautiful first impression of the gardens. Final touches will complete the project this spring, in time to celebrate the 2017 garden season.
Join Ecological Landscape Alliance and Horsley-Witten, project lead, on Tuesday, June 20 at 1 pm to learn more about the entrance gardens and parking lot project and be treated to a guided walking tour through the Heritage Gardens to experience the beauty and learn about the many sustainable initiatives underway at the gardens.
Brian Laverriere is a landscape designer at the Horsley Witten Group. He is a recent graduate of the University of Rhode Island where he earned his bachelor’s degree in landscape architecture with a minor in community planning; during Brian’s last year at URI, he was nominated as the 2015 University Select Olmsted Scholar. Brian offered technical and creative support generating construction level site and landscape plans for the most recent parking gardens development project at Heritage. Brian has experience with LID stormwater management, site planning and design. His professional interests include climate adaptation, green infrastructure and community resiliency.
Leslie Lutz is the Director of Horticulture and Facilities Management for Heritage Museums and Gardens, Sandwich, MA. Les manages all aspects of the 100 acre Garden including design, care, and maintenance of display gardens, trails and natural woodlands. He also responsible for operational maintenance, security, and capital projects. Les has extensive experience in botanical gardens having spent much of his career at Longwood Gardens as the Curator of Bonsai; New York Botanical Garden as the Conservatory Manager; Salisbury University as the Director of Horticulture; and Omaha Botanical Garden as the Chief Operating Officer.
$23 for ELA members, $33 for nonmembers – See more at: http://www.ecolandscaping.org/event/eco-tour-heritage-museums-garden/#sthash.fQdynYDY.dpuf
