at the Park

Atrip to the Ann and Jim Goodnight Museum Park feels different each season. This summer visitors can look forward to spending time in a new space at the smokestack and enjoying native wildflowers blooming in the lower meadow.

In the fall of 2022, the Museum picked up where it had ended the 2016 Park expansion project, continuing the sidewalk that terminated near the smokestack and completing a trail connection between the Park and the Capital Area Greenway. The completed pathway creates a new trail loop that begins and ends at the Welcome Center. The trail has been embraced by visitors, as it provides a direct route into the Museum Park from the Welcome Center and adjacent parking lot, improving visitor experience.

A new patio was created adjacent to the smokestack at the junction of the existing and new sidewalks to form a gathering space for visitors. This space is used to support programming in the Park and provide additional capacity for events taking place at the Welcome Center.

The new terrace gives visitors an opportunity to reflect on the history of the site adjacent to the smokestack, a historical remnant of the North Carolina prison farm and correctional institution that operated on the property from 1920 to 1997. The smokestack patio is a stop on the campus history tour on the NCMA Park App (see page 8). The stop provides information on the Polk Youth Correctional Center.

A new wildflower meadow planting is being established in the Park where Museum Park staff have created sunflower displays in previous years. This field of native wildflowers will provide colorful blooms starting in the spring and continue to bloom through the fall each year. Annual flowers such as plains coreopsis, red phlox, zinnias, cosmos, and sunflowers are incorporated in the planting’s seed mix to provide color in the first year while the perennial native wildflower seed establishes.

Perennial species will bloom beginning in the second year of the planting. Species were selected for their ability to support pollinators and provide forage for birds. Perennial wildflowers seeded in the meadow planting include butterfly milkweed, purple coneflower, blazing star, and rattlesnake master. This new planting is in the lower meadow between artworks Gyre and Crossroads/Trickster I. The completion of this seeding will extend

What’s that whirligig thing? Was that a green heron I saw? Where am I, and where’s the restroom? Download our free app to make the most of your Museum Park experience. Navigate 164 acres of parkland with ease and enjoy self-guided audio tours featuring highlights of the NCMA’s world-class outdoor works of art. In April new audio tours on nature and campus history were added, helping you identify delightful creatures who call our Park home. The NCMA Park App is available from Apple’s App Store and at ncmapark.org (web version for Android).

the Piedmont prairie planting along the Upper Meadow Trail to create a contiguous seven-acre meadow in the center of the Museum Park. Similar to the sunflower displays created in the past, a mowed path is maintained through the planting to provide visitors an immersive experience through the meadow. While the seed establishes, it is critical for visitors to stay on established paths to minimize disturbance to the seed. A permanent frame is installed at the edge of the meadow planting for visitors to capture photo memories of their visit to the Museum Park. The wildflowers, Gyre, and Mark di Suvero’s sculpture No Fuss are framed in the background.

In fall 2022 Museum Park staff created a second sunflower planting to celebrate the reinstallation in West Building. After we saw a noticeable improvement in this planting compared to the summer season sunflower field, we decided to modify the timing and location of future sunflower plantings in the Museum Park. The new peak bloom will be in October, and the sunflower display will now be located near the Welcome Center, beside Vollis Simpson’s Wind Machine