While at the Chicago Botanic Garden use walking trails to visit all the gardens. See Buehler Enabling Garden filled with garden ideas for all abilities.

Set on 385 acres, the Chicago Botanic Garden, in northern Illinois, has 23 gardens and 3 native habitats. Walking trails take visitors within sight of 9 islands and weave around 100 acres of woods; it is here bird watchers have sighted 255 species.

The Buehler Enabling Garden is just one of the gardens at Chicago Botanic Garden. It is filled with garden ideas that can be used at home, no matter a gardener’s age or abilities. The Enabling Garden is host to the Healthcare Therapy and Design program.

Raised Beds

Raise a garden bed off the ground. Gardeners can plant, water and weed the garden bed without bending. The edge of the bed can be built with a flat surface for a gardener to sit or lean on while caring for the plants.

Raised Water Features

The sound of flowing water is a relaxing addition to all gardens. The raised water feature allows a water gardener easier access to care for the plants, fish and pond.

Plants With Texture, Scent and Vision

There are 3,100 plants in the Enabling Garden. These plants were chosen for their pleasant fragrance, bright colors and heavily textured surfaces. Gardeners will be inspired with ideas to use at home.

Surface Access

The walkway surfaces were designed to improve moving through the gardens. The walks drain water away from the flat surfaces, especially after thawing ice or melting snow in this northern climate.

Hanging Baskets

The hanging baskets in this garden are equipped with pulley systems. The pulley allows the gardener to raise and lower a basket for watering and plant maintenance.

Garden Beds with Leg Room

Some of the raised gardens have a shallow bed. This feature puts gardeners, while sitting, within easy reach to plant and care for the garden.

Tool Shed and Cart

These places display and provide information about ergonomically improved tools and techniques for gardening.

Vertical Wall Planters

This garden design allows plants to be grown, in a garden bed, utilizing a minimum amount of floor surface providing a maximum amount of planting surface. Vertical wall planters are an excellent option for small space gardening. Wall planters can be used to grow annuals, herbs, or vegetables.

The massive pergolas, strung across the bridge at the entrance to Chicago Botanic Garden, are a dramatic display. Even this planting design, but downsized for the home garden, is an excellent garden idea to take home. Botanical gardens are meant to be living museums for plant collections, a place to find plant and environment knowledge and where learning about plants is always evolving.