Peace Garden | |
![]() The heart of this garden, located in a shaded enclave of the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center, is the iconic silver Peace Symbol sculpture, designed by Robert Engman in 1969. The sculpture is surrounded by a small grove of Chinese elms, whose reddish exfoliating bark, sinuous forms, and fine-textured foliage adds subtle beauty and dappled shade to the peaceful surroundings. The garden is informal and naturalistic, while the plants are intended to be all-white flowering shrubs, perennials, bulbs, and annuals. Students have historically used this space as a site of protest, such as during the Vietnam War and the Women’s Liberation Movement. The Peace Garden evokes calm and is a reminder of generations of and tribute to student activism at Penn.
Plants in this garden include: 'Ice Dance' Japanese sedge (Carex 'Ice Dance') Daffodil (Narcissus sp.) Plantain lily (Hosta sp.) Goat's beard (Aruncus dioicus) Japanese tree lilac (Syringa reticulata) Chinese elm (Ulmus parvifolia) Thornless common honeylocust (Gleditsia triacanthos var. inermis) |
Images attributed to specific artists are the property of the photographer.
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