LURIE GARDENS

Chicago, United States

Pragya Meena
2018uar1175
the Basics
Located at the southern end of Millennium Park in the Loop area of
Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States.
Area - 3 Acre
Completed in 2004
Open year round; daily from 6:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.
Humid continental type of climate
Cost of Construction $13.2 million
A collaboration between the landscape architecture firm
Gustafson Guthrie Nichol (GGN) and garden designer, Piet Oudolf
The site was inittially a railyard
 the Site
much of downtown Chicago – was on the
shoreline of a broad marsh around the delta of the
Chicago River.

Sinking and mixing into this original landscape, Chicago’s earliest streets were a
muddy mess. In a heroic and extreme transformation, the entire city ground was
filled in, raised up, and entirely decked over to become a perfect, crisp surface for
a future sky-scraping city.

The watery Lurie Garden site was accordingly filled (mostly with the rubble of
the old city burned in the Great Fire), framed, and decked to its current elevation
on the rooftop of a parking garage – awaiting the Garden that would tell the
layered story buried beneath it.
An early GGN concept plan of Lurie Garden. Credit:
Gustafson Guthrie Nichol.
 the Concept
Juxtaposition of natural and constructed
elements tell the exciting story of Chicago as
both a center of commerce and sustainability.

● Lurie Garden is intended to be an ever-changing, dynamic planting

● Piet Oudolf designed a four-season tapestry of color and texture to overlay that structure,
choosing plants that worked well together on the site physically and aesthetically to draw
out the feelings you might encounter in nature
● The plant combinations that Oudolf creates ebb and flow, growing together over the seasons
as plants emerge, mature, and die off at different rates.
● The design inspiration is Chicago’s history; articulated through the primary use of
locally-grown native plants and local stones.The use of regional materials is a constant
reference to Chicago’s place within the Midwestern prairie.
 The Dark and Light Plates meet and are
separated by The Seam – a linear “crack”
in the surface that conceptually extends
down, as watery void, straight through the
parking garage and the fill material, to the
original lake waters directly below.The
Seam is covered with a wood deck, in the
spirit of the city’s first streets to leave the
The bold contrast between the original and the created landscapes of the Lurie Garden site and natural ground – a key step in raising the
the city could hardly be more exciting.The Dark and Light Plates concept – the old vs. new, thick entire city and forever changing the
vs. open, wet vs. dry experience – was developed to tell this story. outdoor experience in Chicago. It marks
The Dark Plate is shady, thick, and moist. The Light Plate is a sunny, dry prairie. The the historic “change angle” of a diagonal,
muscular Shoulder Hedge on the garden’s perimeter encloses and protects the inner garden. lake-fill retaining wall that is buried
beneath the site.
THE DIFFERENT SEASONS
the native perennials (over 200 species) were carefully selected to create a dramatic
sequence of colour and seasonal change. the effect is like a painting whose tone
continually shifts throughout the year.

MARS JUPITER SATURN

Despite being red, Mars is a It’s a gas giant and the biggest Yes, this is the ringed one.
cold place, not hot. It’s full of planet in our Solar System. It’s a gas giant, composed
iron oxide dust, which gives Jupiter is the fourth-brightest mostly of hydrogen and
the planet its reddish cast object in the sky helium
 PLAYING
WITH
SEASONS

near the southeast corner of the garden is a cluster of

goatsbeard ‘Horatio’ (Aruncus ‘Horatio’), which matures to
sturdy, 3-foot shrub-like mounds by early summer. But unlike a
true shrub, it dies back to the ground in winter, so in early
spring there is significant empty space in that area while we
await its lush greenery.

Goatsbeard ‘Horatio’ (Aruncus ‘Horatio’), with mature, 3-foot

shrub-like mounds in June.
 a spring ephemeral called Virginia bluebells (Mertensia
virginica). Virginia bluebells come up in mid-March with large
leaves that cover the ground and keep weeds from sprouting
Then the goatsbeard takes over with lush green growth to hide
the withering brown leaves of the bluebells..

Goatsbeard ‘Horatio’ and Virginia bluebells in April. The bluebells

flower in April with beautiful blue and purple blooms. As the
goatsbeard finally starts to fill out in May and then bloom in June, the
bluebells die back to the ground and go dormant.
 FEATURES
The limestone, soil, and plants were regionally sourced. The beds are
contoured so the visitors walk along with the gardens at knee and waist
height immersing them in colour.

Total garden plantings include 35,000 perennials in 240 varieties and 5,800
woody plants in 14 varieties, more than 60% of which are Midwestern
natives.

Mass perennial plantings provide enough pollen and nectar for bees

Use of native and adapted plants reduces necessary irrigation.

No insecticides, fungicides, or herbicides are needed to maintain the

garden due to plant selection.
 MAPPING
Mapping is another important tool often
used for record-keeping in many botanic
gardens, where each plant typically exists
alone in a particular place. Keeping a map
Map of the “Salvia River” when the meadow sages are at peak bloom in early June. Four different for a garden with intertwining, dynamic
meadow sages with different tones of blue and purple repeat through this section of the garden, plant combinations like those in Lurie
simulating waves in a river. While not everyone will notice this at ground level in the garden, Garden can be more difficult, and so
seeing them on the map draws attention to this design feature. precise mapping isn’t traditionally used in
gardens like ours.
Mapping of the Lurie Garden
 Virginia Bluebells

Notice that the Virginia bluebells are

no longer visible on the map in June
and the Goatsbeard ‘Horatio’ has
taken its place. These maps are
from the same dates as the pictures
shown at the beginning of this post.

Goatsbeard ‘Horatio’
CHALLENGES
A major challenge was how to build a viable
botanical garden on top of an underground
parking garage in downtown Chicago –
creating a natural environment from a
inherently man-made condition.
The garden’s design also had to
accommodate heavy pedestrian traffic
SOLUTIONS
Gustafson Guthrie Nichol’s design for the Lurie Garden
incorporates regional, hardy materials (soil, plants,
limestone, steel, etc) designed and engineered to
succeed in a truly man-made environment.
A giant, muscular hedge encloses the interior garden
from the north and west protecting the heart of the
garden from large crowds.
THANKYOU
This is where you give credit to the ones who are part of this project.
Did you like the resources on this template? Get them for free at our other
websites.
● https://www.gardendesign.com/millennium-park/
● https://www.landscapeperformance.org/case-study-briefs/the-lurie-gard CREDITS
en-at-millennium-park#/products
● https://www.luriegarden.org/2016/04/12/successful-design-inspired-by-si
te-history/
● https://www.gardenvisit.com/blog/lurie-garden/
● https://www.ggnltd.com/the-lurie-garden-at-millennium-park
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