About the Camden Children’s Garden
The Camden Children's Garden is the most exciting project of the Camden City Garden Club. It is a special place for the young and the young at heart to explore and discover the natural world. The Garden provides horticultural experiences for creative and imaginative play.
The 4-acre interactive Garden includes indoor exhibits, the Philadelphia Eagles Four Seasons Butterfly House, the Tropical Exhibit “Plaza de Aibonito,” and the Ben Franklin exhibit. Other exhibits include a Dinosaur Garden, Maze, Picnic Garden, Tree House, Amphitheater and Storybook Gardens. Storybook Gardens include: 3 Little Pigs Garden, the Giants Garden from Jack in the Beanstalk, Secret Garden, Frog Prince Grotto and Alice in Wonderland's Garden. The Garden has three amusement rides, the Commerce Carousel, the Arrow River Train Ride surrounded by the Railroad Garden and the Spring Butterfly Ride.
The Garden is located across the Delaware River from Philadelphia and adjacent to the Aquarium, Tweeter Center, the Battleship New Jersey and the Campbell’s Field, home of the Riversharks Minor League Baseball team. The Children's Garden is easily accessible by car, bus, RiverLink Ferry from Penn's Landing, the PATCO High Speedline, or the River Line train.
The Garden staff can provide informative educational lessons in the Garden or via distance learning. We also provide children's birthday party packages as well as an evening rental program! Both children and adult’s gifts and souvenirs can be purchased in Ginkgo's Gift Shop.
The Garden is open Tuesday through Sunday from 10:00 am—5:00 pm. The Garden is also closed Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day. Admission is $6 for adults, $4 for children (3-11), and free for children two and younger. There is a modest additional fee for the three amusement rides. School Group rates are available, as well as family memberships. Call 856-365-TREE (8733) for additional information or to learn about our Special Events.
Come outside and play…at the Camden Children’s Garden!
We Built It. They Came. And They Raved!
The visitors came from as far away as New Zealand and as close as New Jersey.
But in their admiration for the Camden Children's Garden, they all came from the same place.
About 330 participants in the 16th annual National Children and Youth Gardening Symposium of the American Horticultural Society (AHS) toured the Children's Garden on Saturday, July 26. It was the closing day of the conference, which was co-hosted by the Children's Garden, Longwood Gardens, Winterthur Museum and Country Estate, and the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society.
"We were thrilled to be able to give people from all over the country who love youth gardening the chance to see what we're doing here in Camden - especially with our youth employment and job training program," said Michael Devlin, executive director of the Children's Garden. He and his wife Valerie Frick co-founded the nonprofit Camden City Garden Club in 1985, and the club opened the Children's Garden on the Camden Waterfront in 1999.
"The comments we received from visitors were very gratifying," Devlin said.
Gratifying, indeed.
"I walked out very inspired by the sense of mission," said Lawrence Stier, manager of the Green City Youth project at the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. "I just felt joy to be in the space. And I love the fact that the Children's Garden is designed for fun, and that the learning (element) is incidental. Sometimes we educators forget that."
LaTrelle Oliver, a retired middle school teacher from Georgia, was a first-time visitor. She described the Children's Garden as "an incredible story of commitment" to urban horticulture and the social good.
"You all have done an amazing job making everything look perfect," said Oliver, an AHS member who is active in efforts to build a public garden in her community. "But it doesn't look artificial. I am very impressed by your choice of plant material, and the placement…I also like the scale of the exhibits. There's something very genuine about it."
AHS member Jane Underwood, of Virginia, said a visitor "can't walk around the Children's Garden without smiling." She added, "what Mike and Val have created – you can tell it was a labor of love. It was very heartwarming. And the Garden itself is beautiful."
Jane L. Taylor, who pioneered the youth gardening and children's garden movement across the country – and whose vision inspired the Children's Garden – said visitors came away "with a lot of doable ideas."
Like many of the visitors, Taylor said she was particularly impressed by presentations made by David Henriquez and Marchelle Roberts, graduates of the youth employment and job training program. Both grew up in Camden; Henriquez is a full-time Children's Garden employee, and Roberts will attend Temple University on a full scholarship in the fall.
"They were absolutely eloquent. There was not a dry eye in the audience," Taylor said.
"It's clear how much the Children's Garden is doing to reach out to the children and families of the local community."
The 17 other young Camden residents currently working at the Children's Garden also drew compliments for their courtesy and knowledge. "Everyone was wonderful," Underwood said.
Sara Bailey, a landscape designer and science teacher from Nebraska, was, like Taylor, quite taken by Henriquez and Roberts. "They really understand how you break the cycle" of dysfunction in urban areas, she said. Bailey and several other visitors also praised the Children's Garden Distance Learning program, in which educators reach students in remote locations via the Web.
"Five stars" was the rating given by Virginia Korteweg, of the Beautification Foundation at River Edge, in northern New Jersey. "It was a privilege to visit the Children's Garden," she said. "It just 'shouts' the dedication and the knowledge and the love that two people can have in America."
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