Chicago Botanic Garden
Japanese Garden Lake

Upon Living Habitats completion of the Chicago Botanic Garden’s Shoreline Restoration Master Plan, work along the Japanese Garden Lake shorelines was the next phase of work embarked on to restore and stabilize this world-class landscape at the water’s edge.

With important and powerful Japanese garden style implications and concerns regarding the use of native plant species in and around this lake basin, Living Habitats worked closely with Garden management and staff to ensure that the solution was one that complimented and supported the upslope Elizabeth Hubert Malott Japanese Garden, Sansho-En (the Garden of Three Islands). Originally designed by Koichi Kawana and constructed in 1982, Living Habitats worked to maintain the aesthetics original to the landscape style throughout the detailed design for the restoration of the Japanese Garden lakeshores.

The primary goal was to enhance the Japanese garden experience, as well as create stability of the shoreline with native plants and other strategic infrastructure. We also met a series of technical challenges, removing feet of unconsolidated lake bed sediments while also addressing steeper shoreline slopes and narrow spaces with beautiful, style-appropriate and performative solutions.

The Japanese Garden Lake at the Chicago Botanic Garden is beloved, and we are proud to have our work quietly support Sansho-En and the surrounding mainland shores. Native plantings now artfully blend the Japanese garden upslope and adjacent aquatic environs, further enhancing the quiet beauty of this lake-focused setting.

 

Location:
Glencoe, Illinois

Date:
2005 – 2007

Client:
Chicago Botanic Garden

Team:
FEATHERSTONE INC.: Construction Management

GROUND DESIGN ENGINEERING: Structural Engineering

DANIEL CREANEY COMPANY: Civil Engineering

LIVING HABITATS: Prime Consultant