The Oudolf Garden Detroit designed by Piet Oudolf is a very modern mix, influenced by the layers of his earlier work yet more complex and intricate. Piet is the definition of a modern artist; an open source designer, his planting plans are freely available for all to see online, and he works alone but is inspired by the creativity of others, designing in the realm of an amazing creative spirit.
The Garden Club of Michigan is one of the oldest founding clubs of The Garden Club of America, a network of gardening clubs across the US made up of local gardeners. It is private club on the east side of Detroit where generations of mostly women gardeners have, over decades, undertaken various projects throughout Metro Detroit.
With a recently refreshed membership and a wish to do a significant project for the city, six years ago the group commissioned Piet to design a garden.
Piet was drawn to the garden’s eventual location due to it’s central position. Belle Isle is a special place; in nature but right in the heart of the city. Detroit is emerging from several decades of economic challenge, but is synonymous with curiosity, creativity, freedom and space. It has a huge design and architectural heritage and is the only UNESCO city of design in the US.
Unsure how to contact Piet, the Garden Club of Michigan wrote him a letter and enlisted the help of the filmmaker Thomas Piper (Five Seasons: The Gardens of Piet Oudolf) to get word through to him of their interest.
Oudolf Garden Detroit is the flower garden of dreams. A prairie garden, rain garden and, soon, a wet meadow, it combines Piet’s signature block and matrix planting with his newest thinking and is seeped in hortus loci.
In the prairie garden three repeating palettes fill fifteen curved beds, with an Oudolfian emphasis on form, outline and combination. Eryngium yuccifolium, Echinops, Liatris pycnostachya, Pycnanthemum muticum and Perovskia ‘Blue Steel’ grow cheek-by-jowl, their silhouettes postbloom as important as their flowers. In six beds, a matrix of Sporobolus heterolepis, (prairie dropseed) is threaded with Helenium ‘Moerheim Beauty,’ Salvia nemerosa ‘Mainacht’ and Salvia ‘Crystal Blue,’ to flower in late summer. An Oudolf signature plant, Sporobolus grass is also a Michigan native.
At the western end of the prairie garden is Oudolf’s new rain garden. Ubiquitous in south east Michigan, rain gardens are notoriously tricky to pull off as their plants must thrive in brief but complete flooding. Piet’s solution is one of of uncompromising beauty; a wet sedge matrix of Carex and Deschampsia woven with flowering trees and shrubs.
There are plans in place for a wet meadow-of-the-imagination; a romantic twist on a wetland using all Michigan natives and inspired by the existing seedbank onsite, replete with asters, solidago, sedges and woody plants and a boardwalk.
Over $4.7 million was eventually raised by the Oudolf Garden Detroit team for the installation and upkeep of the garden, the majority in donations each of under $100. Detroit has a legacy of philanthropy and the garden is worked by an all-volunteer crew.
This is community garden but of international significance, with a rockstar designer thinking on a global scale. Beautiful, forward-thinking and full of inspiration.
Photography Ryan Southen/Meredith Simpson
With special thanks to Meredith Simpson, Oudolf Garden Detroit