MICHIGAN’S FARM GARDEN: JOURNEY AND DESTINATION

They say that all roads lead to Rome. Well, at Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park, all roads lead to the Michigan’s Farm Garden—or at least quite a few of them do. Still, nestled in as it is on the far east side of the Meijer Gardens campus, between The Richard & Helen DeVos Japanese Garden and the Frey Boardwalk, this little farm is something of a hidden gem. I’m often surprised to learn that guests who’ve visited Meijer Gardens for years don’t know it’s there, tucked away just around the bend. To get there in the direct and purposeful kind of way, start out on the main path curving around the Lena Meijer Children’s Garden and the new Peter C. & Emajean Cook Transportation Center, then on past the Japanese Garden’s graceful main gate. When you think perhaps you’ve gone too far, keep going. You’ll know you’re almost there when you hear the clear call of the dinner bell ringing, or the creaking of the windmill turning lazily in the summer breeze. A few steps more and the farmhouse rises into view.

A more rambling route takes you on a delightful wetlands tour, over waters breathing with the sound of frog calls and the subtle splash of turtles sliding from sun-warmed logs, through arches of lush vegetation and dappled light, and past broad views of agile egrets and elegant herons wading slowly and silently in search of their next meal. My favorite road to reach the farm, though, leads you on a pathway over a trickling stream (be sure to look down below for mink or muskrat tracks on the muddy banks); past a gnarled and towering maple and a trio of stalwart, sculptural beech trees; and delivers you into the heart of the Gwen Frostic Woodland Shade Garden—a magical space that still makes my breath catch when I look up into the deep canopy of green on a warm, blue-sky summer day. Rest for a moment on one of the benches, or wander the crushed stone pathways to soak it all in. The farm will be waiting for you when you’re ready to keep on.

What you might not realize, as you’re making your way out to the farm, is that you are also making your way back in time. When you step into the welcome shade of the farmhouse porch, you’re stepping back nearly a century. The Michigan’s Farm Garden is designed in the style of the 1930s, during the Great Depression, when family farms were largely self-sustaining, and every member of the family pitched in. The farmhouse is a ¾ scale replica of Lena (Rader) Meijer’s childhood home in Amble, Michigan, just a short car ride from Grand Rapids. The big red barn, built in 1910, was moved from a working farm in Algoma Township. Its wide, white pine siding and ponderosa pine floors, worn smooth over 110 years of daily use, are like nothing you’d easily find in a big-box home improvement store today. The vegetable garden, tended by talented horticulturist Sean Barnes, contains heirloom vegetable varieties uncommon in home gardens or grocery stores now, including more than a dozen types of tomatoes alone. The names and unique, robust flavors can feel foreign to our modern tongues. Green Zebra. Nature’s Riddle. Cherokee Chocolate. Yum. You might have tasted some of these delicious treats if you've dined in the James & Shirley Balk Café.

The sculptures at the Michigan’s Farm Garden are unique to this space, too. A departure from the Modern and Contemporary art of the Sculpture Park on the other side of the Meijer Gardens campus, where so many of the pieces are abstract or nonobjective works, the figural sculptures at the farm contribute to the story of a rural, agricultural way of life—a snapshot of the kind of skilled, hard-working people and indispensable creatures that populated small farms in every community across the country in the 1930s. Fred Meijer personally selected many of these sculptures.

Now that you’ve rounded the bend and arrived at the Michigan’s Farm Garden, please stay a while! Pull up a rocking chair on the porch to idle the afternoon away. Or, if you’re so inclined, explore and take a closer look using the Farm Garden Scavenger Hunt on the next page as your guide.

Essay by Jess Hart, Director of Education

Central to Michigan’s Farm Garden is the replica 1880’s farmhouse. It is a three–quarter scale model of Lena (Rader) Meijer's childhood home. The wrap–around porch has rocking chairs for visitors to reminisce and relax.

Photo by Peter McDaniel.