Built Work Images:

Before and After Images:

Miami Beach, FL (Opened to the public on 11.29.11)

Miami Beach Botanical Garden, created in 1962 as a city park, is a 2.6 acre botanical garden in the heart of Miami Beach.  Our firm was selected to design the $1.2 million dollar landscape renovation, which is currently under construction.  The garden will become an enlivened urban green space with significant botanical richness and programmed elements to better serve the community for educational events and gatherings for multiple occasions, private and public.

The design is ultimately about the articulation of spaces; gathering space, space for contemplation, intimate space, and public space.  With the constraints of a very low budget, we decided to make the most of what is already there, plant wise, hardscape wise, and building wise.  We chose to change certain elements of the existing garden that will have the most impact, while also creating a variety of spaces that will have their own character and sense of place.  This will enable several events to happen at the same time and will provide garden visitors with more choices when they come to the garden.

There will be a new sense of entry that is not there now.  It will be processional, creating multiple experiences as one enters the garden.  Water remains a vital element in all of our gardens, particularly in a botanical garden, where water plants can aid in increased botanical diversity while creating essential open space.  Shade is important as well as overall cohesiveness of the design and horticultural elements.  When the garden is complete, it will be very easy and enticing to circulate around the entire garden.  There will not be any restrictive fences or anything of that nature, which is presently there.

Our firm is known for trying to creating habitat in all of our gardens.  Rather than having native plants tucked into a corner of the garden, as presently shown, native plants will be linked throughout the garden, highlighted for their capabilities for use in the urban environment.  There will be larger quantities of native plantings so that we can begin to knit the urban habitat together.  This will allow refuge and areas of exploration for the insects, birds and other creatures that will enrich and enliven the spaces.  There was a wish list of plants provided by the garden’s horticulturalist, and we have included as many as possible.  The plant palate includes flowering trees, palms, cycads, and other subtropical plants that have the true scale to fit the garden space.

We have created a very long site line when you first enter the garden, that will magnify the scale of what is presently there.  There will be a larger green open space or grand lawn allowing flexibility of events.  A large water garden has been designed which will bring the sky into the garden, animate the space, and reflect the landscape.  The water garden will cool the areas directly around the buildings and will once again magnify the sense of scale for the space.  There will be a new covered terrace off of the great room, more than doubling the capacity for events.  There will be a separate nursery growing and propagation area that will not be in the main core of the buildings.  This will free up the spaces between the buildings, allowing the spaces to function more like an atrium or as courtyard spaces for circulation.