NYC Urban Garden Standouts
Greenacre Park was designed by Sasaki, Dawson, DeMay Associates with Masao Kinoshita as lead designer. Greenacre Park opened in 1971 as a “vest” pocket park and is privately funded and maintained by Abby Rockefeller Mauze’s Greenacre Foundation. The park is 60-feet wide by 120-feet deep, and conveys an impression of far greater size through a series of well-defined, separate spaces, lush planting, textural variation, and the dramatic use of water. Separated from the street by trellis covered steps, the first terrace is shaded by honey locusts and introduces water first as a fountain and then as a runnel. The dramatic 25-foot cascade fountain in the rear sunken terrace is the culmination of the garden, open to the sky and set off from the other terraces by lush evergreen plantings.\
Located in the East Village on 6th Street between Avenues B and C, 6BC is a community garden but is structured like a botanical garden. The garden includes hundreds of native and non-native plants rather than the more common vegetable plots. The garden was founded in the 1980s on a rubble strewn vacant lot. and has been able to withstand the threat of development over the years. Today the garden’s land has been permanently set aside for public use as part of the New York City Parks system. 6BC us a Green Thumb garden and is run and maintained by community members.