I love all things garden – planting flowers, tending plants, collecting vintage garden tools, and visiting gardens wherever we travel. If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you may recall the post about our garden during the 2022 Madison in Bloom Garden Tour. And if you happened to have toured our small courtyard garden, you may recall seeing a few pieces of art glass popping out amid the plantings. There’s something about the form and color of blown glass that speaks to me. Art glass in a garden? It’s a killer combination.
Ken and I recently traveled to St. Louis for Chihuly in the Garden 2023 at the Missouri Botanical Garden. We’d seen our first garden installations of Dale Chihuly glass when we visited this garden in 2010, and we were interested to see the gardens again with colorful new art glass additions. The day was a hazy hot one, but we had a lovely visit.
The above photos are only a sample, but there are literally thousands of pieces of glass within the 20 individual garden installations. Get the lay of the land with the Chihuly Exhibit garden map and a closer look at all of the Chihuly installations within the Missouri Botanical Garden. It’s such a stunning art + nature experience.
It’s hard to believe that each incredibly beautiful piece started out as a blob of hot glass at the end of a pipe. Equally hard to imagine is how master glass blowers like Chihuly have the creative vision to imagine and create such joyful shapes that translate movement in their rigid form.
We’ve been fortunate to see beautiful Chihuly exhibits and installations all across the country. Garden settings being my favorite, Chihuly at Biltmore in 2017 was spectacular, possibly the gold standard for me. Here’s a walk down memory lane of favorite Chihuly experiences.
If you find yourself near St. Louis this summer or early fall, be sure to take time for a visit to Missouri Botanical Garden. Daytime viewing of Chihuly in the Garden 2023 is included in Garden admission, and the exhibit runs through October 15th.
