The 2016 Quebec Garden Festival
Is there little more aspirational than a meandering wander through nature? SATORI & SCOUT explores the latest International Garden Festival in Quebec (Canada) where in its 17th year, this wonderful festival has a total of 26 projects. With five new gardens presented for the very first time, the festival is to be open to the public until 2nd October 2016. Each project creates environments, each using a variety of architectural designs and materials.
As Reford Gardens explain, "The Festival is a unique forum for innovation and experimentation and an exceptional showcase and launching pad for participating designers from a host of disciplines. It provides an annual rendez-vous for admirers of contemporary gardens and design as well as offering a unique space for those involved in the renewal of this art form." Below are SATORI & SCOUT's favourite installations:
The Cyclops by Craig Chapple is a conical object that frames views of the surrounding landscape (and sky), and is made up of a hundred eight metre long timber planks that are all held around a central circular opening. Like a camera's lens, guests are able to experience the frame from the inside-out and via the design's transparency and lightweight nature, the dynamic object blends wonderfully with the environment. A creative experience.
Le Caveau by Christian Poules is a simplistic enclosure that is constructed from stone and earth, and is designed as such to be a place for reflection and inward seeking. With its walls of stacked stone-filled gabions, light is able to filter inside the space which minimalistically features an altar-like planted plinth that gives the impression of levitation. A serene experience.
La Maison de Jacques by Romy Brosseau, Rosemarie Faille-Faubert and Emilie Gagné-Loranger is a novel arrangement of rows and columns of beans that are grown around many wooden structures. Entered and progressed via stepping stones, guests can wander between the the partitions that divide the space into a series of hidden gardens, each forming playful (but obvious) hiding places. With many of the beans growing more than three metres in height, the space is a living Jack and the Beanstalk home. A playful experience.
TiiLT by SRCW is an interactive garden that is part-sculpture, part-landscape. With accessible triangular pavilions that provide a place for guests to interact and enjoy, every structure has the ability to be flipped between its two orientations, allowing guests to naturally respond to the positioning of the overhead sun, or offer alternate pathways through the site. An interactive experience. Which one is your favourite? Discover more at RefordGardens.com.
Photography credit : RefordGardens.com