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Plant Talk

Inside The New York Botanical Garden

Sculpting the Land with Kim Wilkie

Posted in People, Programs and Events on February 19 2014, by Lansing Moore

Kim Wilkie

It is hard to believe a month has already passed, but tomorrow is the second lecture in our 14th Annual Winter Lecture Series. The Garden is lucky to welcome Kim Wilkie, a London-based landscape architect and Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, to the Ross Lecture Hall on Thursday. His lecture, entitled Sculpting the Land, will offer a photographic tour of his forward-thinking and utterly unique designs, incorporating his signature landforms and architectural innovations.

In his own words, Kim Wilkie is a landscape architect who loves mud. The technique of making sculpted hardscapes out of clay and chalk have an ancient history in the United Kingdom, and Wilkie adapts these traditions to breathe new life into antique gardens.

Boughton Park, Northamptonshire

One eye-catching example is Boughton Park at Northamptonshire, a seventeenth-century garden where Wilkie created an “inverted pyramid” of grass to complement the existing landscape, matched with a golden spiral. This lecture will fully explore the architectural side of landscape architecture and design.

Heveningham Hall, Suffolk

We personally can’t wait to hear about Heveningham Hall, another historic house with grand old trees where Wilkie installed sweeping grass terraces that fan out in a Fibonacci arc. Landscape architecture is most exciting when it can blend the old with the new.

Kim Wilkie’s lecture begins at 10 a.m on Thursday, February 20, in the Ross Lecture Hall. He will also share some of his other projects across Europe and the United States, including projects where he translates his ideas into more urban environments. Wilkie will further guide the audience through his portfolio and other highlights from his 20-year career, all of which are included in his latest book, Led by the Land, Landscapes by Kim Wilkie, which will be available for purchase at the lecture as well as NYBG’s Shop in the Garden. See our 14th Annual Winter Lecture Series page for more information or to register tickets.