Wanderwood Gardens
Deneen Powell Atelier, Inc. (DPA) designed Wanderwood Gardens as an immersive “winding woodland” experience—a natural environment where children can explore, imagine, engage in appropriate physical risks, and develop a lasting connection to nature, while creating an experience uniquely rooted in the ecology, landscape, and history of the Driftless Zone. Wanderwood Gardens is a living landscape where physical activity, environmental education, imaginative play, and family experiences occur together. Most importantly, this Garden was designed in response to a growing concern about the deleterious effects of children’s increasing exposure to electronic media and decreased opportunities for outdoor play.
Wanderwood provides a place for children to test their balance, strength, coordination, creativity, and confidence while developing teamwork and social skills. At the same time, the Garden’s wooded setting, limestone features, native plantings, and immersive learning opportunities introduce children and families to flora, fauna, geology, and cultural heritage of the region. The underlying philosophy of environmental stewardship begins with a deep connection to a particular place. Wanderwood Gardens allows children to experience nature as something exciting, beautiful, and awe inspiring, and seeks to establish an enduring connection between play and stewardship.
Community Stewardship and Social Responsibility
The Owners, Debi and Andy Butler, gifted this immersive environmental education and children’s play-in-the-woods asset to the Dubuque community. Immensely involved in developing brain health facilities and legislation in the local community and state, the Butler’s recognized how play in nature would provide the ultimate sensory experience for children, improving their behavioral and social skills as well as physical acumen. We can’t thank them enough for allowing us to be the lead designers on this fantastic project.
The Play Patch
The southern section of the garden is tot focused, with storytelling spaces, small-scale climbers, and low log climbers in a potting shed-themed area. An endemic Pleistocene ice-age relic snail found only in the area is the inspiration for central water feature, where a floating granite ball is the snail’s shell and its slime trail is a shallow splash stream leading to a paint-with-water on a leaf-shaped black slate wall. Plantings transition from the showy ornamentals of the adjacent Arboretum to the native woodlands to the north.
Garden of Melodies
Children of all ages can explore sound in the Garden of Melodies. Discover wind chimes, percussion instruments and drums. Feed pebbles into the mouths of two giant salamanders and listen to the rain-stick melody as they ping off the tiny pins within.
Dendy Village
The place of make believe. A tiny village of small organically shaped houses with round doors, thick walls, and tiny backyard gardens. Doors and windows are sized for the little ones, while interiors are tall and comfortable for mom and dad.
The Dubuque Mine Camp
Dubuque’s local history is steeped in lead mines, which Wanderwood Gardens embraces with an exploratory mine camp. Children can build balsa forts that expand mine structures, explore the mine tunnel, dig for found treasures, fill mine carts, and climb to the top of the mine camp hill using ropes and lugs. A BMX-style running track with banked turns encourages a scamper through the trees, while a snake-shaped path curves through an allée of firs that remain from the Christmas tree farm, leading to quiet areas at each end.
The Canopy
Taking full advantage of a sloping site, the accessible treehouse decks lead to a large, elevated net end at a rope vee bridge, tempting young explorers out to a crow’s nest 16-feet above the forest floor. Multiple points of entry, including log climbers, log round steps, a net tunnel, and spiral staircase provide children numerous choices. Up, down, and around—the area offers every way to play outdoors in the trees.
Wandering Waters
Misty fog billows like magic — low rolling on cool days, lofty and shimmering on warm days. Children appear and disappear as the mist that rises from custom artistic fish grates. Laminar flow jump-jets spring into action in random patterns keeping the kids fully engaged while they attempt to predict the next sequence and flashes from the water fountains. Step on the grate to stop the water or let them run willy-nilly until you’re completely soaked on hot days. Meander down to the next level below and interact with the cascading waterfall where water hisses over limestone blocks into the linear pool below.
Finishing Touches
Badgers, monarchs, bobcats, owls, snails and tons more critters are waiting to be discovered in the custom gates, railings, and sculptures designed by DPA specifically for Wanderwood. In Dendy Village, funny little chickens oversee flower boxes, and a rack of small mailboxes welcome you to the homes where little visitors post personal messages to their favorite garden fairy. Vintage tools enhance the Dubuque Mine Camp from a lunch box, to picks and a sledgehammer, to a cauldron and ropes, to a pulley and mine cart tracks — all real Dubuque historical artifacts expertly collected and lovingly donated by a gracious Dubuque gentleman. Discovery Cases grace the entry courtyard providing an ever-changing opportunity for visitors and staff to display Wanderwood found nature objets. And the list goes on…
The Team
Jeri, Jon and the DPA team want to thank all those involved in helping to create Wanderwood Gardens. Everyone jumped onboard and worked incredibly hard in the heat of summer through the freezing temps of winter to accomplish and build this Garden. This was definitely one of the best teams DPA has ever worked with — multitalented, fun, witty, and wild. The Major Players are:
Owners: Debi and Andy Butler, The Butler Children’s Garden Foundation | Lead Designer: Deneen Powell Atelier, Inc.
Architecture: Stickley Morton Architects | Construction: Conlon | Structural Engineer: Zimmer Design, LLC | Mechanical & Electrical Engineer: Axiom Consultants
Water Quality Specialist: Satchell Engineering & Associates, Inc. | Civil Engineer: Buesing & Associates, Inc. | Tree Sculptures: David Middlebrook | Digital Branding Agency: Gigantic
Photos: Gigantic & DPA