Capen Garden
Botanic Garden of Smith College

Northampton, Massachusetts
2002 to present

Capen Garden is a rustic Beaux Arts jewel on the Smith College campus featuring annual and perennial displays, knot garden, gazebo and horticulture class facilities, all set within a frame work of an arbor and Hemlock hedges. This jewel is little-known, however, due to lack of visible access and marred by lack of special definition and screening. The DDA design for Capen Garden responds to these problems and, in a larger sense, expresses the opportunities inherent in its existing state. The design incorporates gateways, walkways, cedar pavilions, thematic plantings, a lily pool, fountain and other special features laid out axially as a series of outdoor rooms. These rooms accommodate new uses for the Garden. Visitors in the near furture will come to Capen Garden for Art Department sculpture exhibits, outdoor classes and College festivities as well as for garden appreciation and horticultural education.