A Massive Garden Oasis With An “Indoor/Outdoor Feel” Is Coming To Midtown This Fall
The garden seeks to re-shape how we experience NYC by encouraging visitors to connect to their surroundings and to slow down and take pleasure in the world.
This fall, Midtown will welcome a brand new public park and garden, filled with artisan food stands, a gorgeous waterfall, and all the greenery you can imagine to convince you it’s summertime year-round.
The project of international architecture, landscape, and interior design firm Snøhetta, this new 21,300+ square-foot public park will occupy a space at 550 Madison Avenue between 55th and 56th Streets.
Unlike anything Midtown has ever seen, the design re-envisions the building’s public space as a generously expanded, densely vegetated garden, according to Snøhetta’s website. This urban garden will include dozens of trees, 200 shrubs, 2,000 bulbs and 10,000 perennials and will be comprised of five sections, each with a different focal structure, reports NBC New York.
These, alongside other plantings, will encourage a variety of birds, butterflies, and other pollinators to thrive in this environment, creating the ultimate shared urban habitat.
Partially covered by a glass canopy, visitors will experience an indoor-outdoor feel, and the circular rooms invite them to linger as they wander through, allowing the garden to accommodate a variety of experiences for its visitors: to catch up and socialize with friends over lunch, relax next to the sounds of the waterfall, or simply connect back to nature in the middle of the Concrete Jungle.
In a statement to NBC New York, partner and discipline director of Landscape at Snøhetta, Michelle Delk, stated, “A central cascading fountain aligns with the view from the interior lobby, seasonal plantings create interest and variety, food and retail kiosks, public restrooms, a circular hearth offering warmth during the winter, and a variety of fixed and moveable seating are distributed throughout.”
Once officially open, this garden oasis will be open to visitors Monday-Sunday from 7a.m. – 11p.m., and all we know is we can’t wait!