Green Spring Gardens is creating a Moon Gate Garden, funded by gifts to the Fairfax County Park Foundation. This beloved park is a must-visit public garden and historic site that provides year-round inspiration for home gardeners and for lovers of nature and history. Explore 31 acres, 22 demonstration gardens, a woodland stream valley, and ponds. Green Spring also has a 1784 historic house, changing art exhibits, gift shops, and a plant shop with a wide selection of specimens propagated onsite.
In 1970, most of Green Spring’s present-day acreage and the Historic House were donated to FCPA by owners Michael and Belinda Straight, whose family home transformed into a treasured community resource. The Moon Gate Garden project will create a permanent commemoration of the site’s recent 50th anniversary in the form of a beautiful architectural feature and garden. The Moon Gate Garden site location is indicated with the yellow circle.
Give to Green Spring’s moon gate project, which will include a mix of traditional and modern design concepts to draw visitors into this new Asian-inspired garden. The medium will reflect elements of Green Spring’s historic landscape, designed by trailblazing garden designer Beatrix Farrand in 1942. Beatrix Farrand’s own signature moon gate is an acclaimed feature of the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Garden in Seal Harbor, Maine.
Moon gates originated in ancient Asian gardens. Guests who passed through them were symbolically granted an auspicious welcome and good fortune. In garden design they provide enticing window views or passageways from one space into another, piquing curiosity about what lies beyond. A fitting way to celebrate Green Spring’s first fifty years, and to look forward to the next.
You can help make this commemorative project a reality! Green Spring’s Moon Gate Garden project will provide a place of sanctuary and inspiration for 200,000 annual visitors. It will also provide a stunning backdrop for photography and events, and serve as a symbolic connection between the past and the future.
Find information that will help Park Authority visitors and donors follow the progress of this exciting project. See the Project, Location, Design Concept & Plant Inspiration Board at the Park Authority's Moon Gate Garden Project webpage!
Thank you to the thoughtful supporters listed below whose generosity through the Fairfax County Park Foundation will help fund the Moon Gate Garden project at Green Spring Gardens.
Special appreciation is extended to Arlene Evans and Barry Dewberry (pictured) whose substantial support will result in a new feature at beautiful Green Spring Gardens. The lasting Moon Gate Garden will serve as a permanent commemoration of the site’s 50th anniversary in the form of stunning new architectural and horticultural features.
Moon gates originated in ancient Asian gardens. It is said that guests who passed through them were symbolically granted an auspicious welcome and good fortune. Future visitors to FCPA’s beautiful Green Spring Gardens are fortunate that our Signature Benefactors stepped up to personally underwrite the Moon Gate Garden stone structure and hardscape. Thank you, Arlene and Barry!
Memorialize Someone Special at the Moon Gate Garden
Green Spring Gardens is a gorgeous park to honor the life of a loved one, especially as part of the Moon Gate Garden.
Generous donor, Victor E. Schwartz, Esq. shared, "I am pleased to make a memorial contribution to honor my dear friend, Susan G. Akroyd, (1945-2021) a retired principal at Parklawn Elementary, a Title I school. It is fitting that Susan will be memorialized in the seating area of the future Moon Gate garden at beautiful Green Spring Gardens where we enjoyed conversations and many walks together."
Funds are being raised for the plantings that will complete the Moon Gate into a beautiful Garden! Donors contributing $5,000 or more will be recognized on a lovely plaque to be installed within the Moon Gate Garden. Donate $50 or more to add your name or to honor someone special!