A Timeless Botanical Garden

Gretchen Gregor with her “time capsule” box.

How do you know you are a truly timeless botanical garden?

That’s easy: when a 10-year-old chooses you for her time capsule project, of course!

Gretchen Gregor, age 10, a 5th grader at Henrico County Schools’  Shady Grove Elementary School did just that.

Gretchen Gregor with the big reveal of her time capsule.

“I chose Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden because this place stands out to me. Me and my aunt come here every year (to Dominion GardenFest of Lights) and like to look at the decorations,” Gretchen says.

Gretchen Gregor shows a picture of herself in front of the bike sculpture at last year’s Dominion GardenFest of Lights.

Her mom, Stacy Gregor, chimes in, “….and because you’ve been coming here since you were a baby.”

Of course the box had to have a representative of Butterflies LIVE! in it.

Gretchen collected symbols of the Garden: a postcard of the CWDKids Treehouse from the Garden Shop, flower petals, a toy butterfly and a flashing blinking necklace to represent GardenFest lights. She put it all in a pink box decorated in silk ivy leaves and metallic butterflies. Gretchen explains, “For the time capsule project we had to choose a place in Henrico County.  My favorite part was creating it because I like coming here. I liked collecting all the information about Ginter because this is my favorite place in pretty much in the whole world!”

Did you hear that? I can’t think of a higher complement.

“If I could bury my time capsule anywhere in Henrico, I would bury it in the tunnel under the tree house at Lewis Ginter. One reason why I would choose the tunnel is because it is a great secret hiding place,” her report reads. We should note that Gretchen didn’t actually bury the box here at the Garden, but if she did, someone would have an idea of what we are about.

So, how’d she do? We give her an A+. Her teacher agrees: 100 percent!

Anyone who opens the time capsule will want to see a map of our Garden in the year 2015.