The Orchard at White Street Park

About

The Orchard at White Street Park was designed to combine the enjoyment of edible fruit with play features rooted in the natural playground movement.

Categories Place Botanic & Arboretum Children's Gardens Community Gardens Parks & Play Spaces

Project Details

Description

The Orchard at White Street Park was designed to combine the enjoyment of edible fruit with play features rooted in the natural playground movement. The purpose of the Orchard was to provide an alternative to typical playgrounds and nurture curiosity among children and adults about the growth and life cycles of fruiting plants. The project was initiated by a local landscape architect and aligned with the City's vision for an undeveloped future phase of this park. While there was no formal public input process, the design was refined and adjusted over a long period with input from City planning, public works, and elected officials. Ultimately, the final design and construction budget were approved by the City Council. As an effort to engage the designer and the citizens in public support, the City agreed to provide the construction of the park if the community purchased, installed, and managed all fruiting plants. The designer led the effort for community support and raised over $17,000, most of which came from the sale of corporate and personal plaques now located at the entrance and specific locations within the park. Numerous community planting efforts saw the installation of hundreds of plants and have made the Orchard what it is today.

The Orchard is an approximately 1-acre garden within a larger City Park. A perimeter fence with spring-loaded gated access doors prevents deer from browsing the edible landscape. At the main entrance, a pavilion provides shade and refuge from severe weather. A pathway, lined with granite cobbles and mulched with red terracotta chips, provides character as it winds around the site. Over 75 cultivated varieties of fruiting plants line the walkways and beyond. Visitors who wander off the mulched path may be rewarded with a unique fresh fruit or a fun and secluded space to stop and rest. A large constructed earthen mound near the bottom of the site provides vistas for those who climb up and offers two slides, 12 and 33 feet long respectively . A children's play area features a hand water pump, balance beams, a pea gravel play bin, a musical instrument, and a meandering flagstone pathway.

The Orchard has won local awards for design as it continues to grow. Features like the weeping mulberry tree room have finally taken shape as the tree matured, and the fruiting plants have grown increasingly productive as they become more established. The orchard has also become a popular location for Scout-related projects such as insect hotels, bat boxes, water tables, a chimney swift tower, the pea gravel bin, and others. Future plans include a sensory pathway and enhancement of blackberry production.

There are no entrance fees, as the site is a free-to-access public park.

Other Details

Design Firm
Columbia Engineering

Project Managers
Roger Grant, PLA

Funders & Supporters
The City of Suwanee Council

Total Cost
$250,000

Amenities & Services

walking paths
lawns
fresh free fruit
play features

Low wooden balance beam structures for children are scattered throughout a grove of fledgling trees. Full-grown trees stand tall in the back of the grove.

A crowd of children are climbing up and gathering to form a line behind a tall slide, which is propped up on a green hill.

Three children team up to use a water pump as another child rinses his hands under the spout.

The original site as it looked before the Orchard and play area were installed. It was a large, grassy clearing bordered by tall green trees.

On grand opening day, a group of adults and children are looking at a view of an open area encircled by tall trees. Other people are scattered throughout the area and the earthen mound with slides are in the right background.

Standing atop the earthen mound near the entrance to a slide provides a clear view of the park that includes healthy trees, open grassland, and a play area.

Recent Case Studies

A large group of participants express their excitement at the start of a backpacking trip. Trees and distant mountains fill the horizon behind them.

Program

Wild Hearts Idaho

Wild Hearts Idaho is a non-profit that builds community, confidence, and leadership skills for middle and high school girls through free outdoor adventures.

A close-up shot of Dan riding his trike with a confident grin.

Program

Spokes Fighting Strokes

Spokes Fighting Strokes (Spokes) introduces recovery through exercise and fun by providing recumbent trikes to stroke survivors, amputees, able-bodied humans, and those with or who have had traumatic brain injury (TBI), neck and back injury, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis (MS), and cerebral palsy (CP).

An aerial image of the playground showing play equipment, gathering spaces, and a painted ground mural looping around the playground.

Place

Louis H. Farrell Elementary School

This project was designed to advance literacy and learning goals while promoting playful learning in public schoolyards. Key features include a Gateway Plaza, a Literacy Art Loop, an Outdoor Classroom & Performance Space, separate play areas for older and younger children, and a Native Pollinator Meadow & Nature Discovery Trail.