synkd | inspirational works
TUCKER RANCH WELLNESS PARK Connecting People to Wellness Through Landscape Design
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ot far from the excitement of Disney World and the crashing waves along the beaches of Florida’s Atlantic Coast sits a relatively quiet city park poised to become a regional asset. Projected for completion in 2025, the core of the existing 209-acre, family-friendly public park will be transformed into a wellness park—a series of cultivated gardens and buildings. Visitors will be invited to taste, learn and exercise as they experience the unique beauty of Central Florida’s subtropical flora. History Tucker Ranch once provided beef cattle for the region west of Orlando, Florida. In 2011, the city of Winter Garden purchased the land from the Tucker family, whose wish was for it to become a city park. With a state grant, the city invested in creating the Tucker Recreational Park and Nature Preserve, which
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opened to the public in 2018 offering a playground, picnic area, nature trails and a paddle craft launch on Johns Lake.
Within the expansive park sits a wide lawn, about 20 acres of former cattle grazing land bordered by a live oak-shaded playground, hedgerows and woodlands. This grassy open space is where the city is working with Floridabased 3.Fromme Design and HDLA, a planning, landscape architectural and urban design firm based in Nashville, Tennessee, to realize a vision of the land
once again providing nourishment for the region through the Tucker Ranch Wellness Park. Upon completion of the project, visitors will be encouraged to feed their minds, bodies and souls as they move through and experience a variety of edible plantings, outdoor exercise spaces and a series of thematic gardens. An open-air demonstration kitchen and multi-purpose event building will provide opportunities for educational programming and community activities that will anchor the park as a hub for civic activity. Vision The city of Winter Garden has developed a vision of a smaller botanical garden within a larger park, a cultivated centerpiece that will reflect the fecundity of the surrounding nature. “The vision is to create an attractive destination that will inspire and educate,” says Principal Designer Tres Fromme. “It will be a beautiful way of drawing people into the site
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