It’s going to blow your mind
“It should make people cry.”
That’s how Jim Garland, who designs fountains for a living, describes the revitalization of the Main Grand Fountain at Longwood Gardens, which is set to re-debut on May 27 after two years and $90 million in renovations and repairs.
In a video previewing the fountain’s return, Garland, of Fluidity Design Consultants, and a host of other project partners explain just how much work went into the restoration.
Led by architecture firm Beyer Blinder Belle, 4,000 pieces of limestone were restored and brand new mechanical and electrical infrastructure were installed. Landscape architecture firm West 8 redesigned the public spaces surrounding the garden fountain, and new gardens are in the works, too.
Meanwhile, the fountain display, which has always been pretty epic, is truly taking it to another level.
“The fountains will do more than they used to,” Garland says in the video. By “more,” he means that the re-designed fountain infrastructure now allows the nozzles to shoot out fire, in addition to water.
It’ll definitely be a change from the fountain’s beginnings. It first debuted in 1931 after years of planning and construction led by Pierre S. Dupont. The Longwood Gardens founder modeled it after the European garden and fountain displays of that time. Before its temporary closing in 2014, the fountain remained one of the main attractions of Longwood Gardens, attracting more than one million visitors each year.
Here’s the video that offers a sneak preview of the fountain’s May 27 return.
New Heights [Longwood Gardens]