After more than a decade of planning, demolition, and digging, Traverse City's former asylum is now a 25-acre botanical garden.

The new Botanic Garden at Historic Barns Park is on the grounds of the Grand Traverse Commons, a former state mental asylum built in the late 19th century. It is taking shape around what was once the asylum’s farm incorporating existing meadows, hillsides, abandoned buildings, and a pair of Victorian barns.

About half of the garden will remain in its natural state, the rest will feature themed gardens including: a walled garden with Michigan wildflowers, a picnic area, and a landscaped visitor's center with native plants.

"We chose healing as our theme, whether it’s healing the spirit, healing the land, healing the buildings around us," says Karen Schmidt, chair of the Botanical Garden Society of Northwest Michigan.

The centerpiece of the year-round garden is its Visitor Center, a former granary dating to 1886 which includes an underground tunnel. It is now repurposed into a state-of-the art meeting and reception area surrounded by pools, a waterfall, an outdoor pavilion, native shrubs and perennials. There’s also a community garden with about 60 plots and a small agriculture demonstration area.

The park's design was prepared by Warren Byrd of the Charlottesville, Virgina landscape architectural firm of Nelson Byrd Woltz, and will eventually feature a traditional Native American "medicine wheel" garden, a medicinal herb garden and labyrinth, a wheelchair-accessible garden for the handicapped, a meditation garden and a water garden.

The nearby barns belong to local governments which take care of another 29 acres of land adjacent to the garden. Together, the two are being managed as a venue for weddings, concerts and conferences. The largest barn has space for up to 450 people. A grassy slope will become home to an outdoor amphitheater for concerts and performances.

At its peak, the asylum housed as many as 3,000 patients. Its farm made the institution largely self-supporting. The farm included fields, fruit orchards, dairy barns and livestock pens. It was closed in the 1950s. The location was chosen because of the fresh water available at the site.

Botanic Garden at Historic Barns Park
Botanic Garden at Historic Barns Park
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