The International Garden Festival is pleased to announce the names of the designers selected by the jury for the 16th edition of the Festival presented at the Jardins de Métis / Reford Gardens from June 27 to September 27, 2015. The competition attracted 309 proposals for contemporary gardens submitted by over 700 architects, landscape architects, designers and artists from 34 countries. “Buzz” is the operative word guiding the 2015 Festival with new creations by designers from Canada, France and Israel. The installations selected by the jury have a special energy and connection to the natural world. The temporary gardens have a degree of interactivity that encourages visitors to enter with enthusiasm. The goal is to intrigue visitors with the unusual or to impress by new ways of presenting what is common. The new gardens selected for the 2015 edition are: Around-About by Talmon Biran architecture studio [Roy Talmon, architect & Noa Biran, architect], Tel Aviv, Israel. Three large mobile harrows are placed inside a gravel field. These instruments, whose design is inspired by traditional agricultural machinery, rake gravel in a circular manner. Here visitors will be active participants in the composition and the deconstruction of the garden. Unlike the Japanese Zen garden, which is designed to be seen from the outside, this garden will be viewed, created and experienced from the inside, through a joyful and playful activity. As visitors walk away from the roundabouts, their footsteps violate the orderly pattern of the gravel. Once they get back on the roundabouts and spin them, the garden returns to its ordered perfection. The two architects that form Talmon Biran architecture studio work on architectural projects as well as artist installations and urban interventions. They have a range of experience working with private, public and commercial clients in a variety of typologies and scales - from interior design and building design to urban planning and landscape design. Their work is characterized by a multidisciplinary approach, born of their experiences in visual arts, dance, photography and video.http://www.talmonbiran.com. Carré bleu sur fond blanc by o.k. [Kihan Kim, landscape architect & Ophélie Bouvet, landscape architect], Paris, France. The idea for this garden was born from a chance discovery made under a hammock. Stubborn in their search of sun, flowers had pushed through the netting and pierced it with their bloom. They created a random pattern on the blank canvas of the hammock. This reinterpretation of a natural phenomenon will create a contemplative garden where the fabric will act as a filter that will be activated by the blooming plants. The resulting tapestry will be woven by the flowers each day of the Festival. The surface will vibrate with the confusion between the plants that are immersed or submerged. Recent graduates in landscape architecture, the members of this team share a desire to generate a dialogue between the points of view and disciplines that probe our environment. Building on the strength of their international experience, from Edinburgh to Barcelona, Paris to Seoul, Kihan Kim and Ophélie Bouvet focus their approach on the senses explored through visual experimentation. They play with the boundaries to assert their differences and their qualities. Between art, architecture and botany, they seek to use their skills to create the unexpected.http://www.kihankim.com. I like to move it by DIX NEUF CENT QUATRE VINGT SIX Architecture [Mathilde Gaudemet, architect & Arthur Ozenne, architect], Paris, France. In this garden, the visitor will face a seemingly wild meadow. Grasses and a few birch trees grow together against the backdrop of dense greenery. There seems to be little going on here. But the straight lines at ground level, punctuating the space, create a rhythm and attract the visitor’s attention. On approaching one turns around, scans, wonders and finally touches. That is when the trees begin to move. Visitors can slide the trees along their tracks and create their own garden. The banal becomes strange. Nature domesticated transforms the landscape into a garden. Trees, immobile and mute, are rootless and move as living beings. All due to human interaction. DIX NEUF CENT QUATRE VINGT SIX Architecture was born from a desire to create contemporary architecture that can be appropriated and understood by all. Considering architectural practice as a real place of experimentation, these architects place as much emphasis on the poetic qualities of a space at its construction. Their practice draws its inspiration from the relationship between the individual and the collective, the particular and the universal, the exceptional and the banal, incorporating the ongoing effort to put people at the heart of their projects. http://www.19-86.fr. Popple by Meaghan Hunter, landscape architect & Suzy Melo, landscape architect, Winnipeg (Manitoba) Canada. In a wooded area, a large curtain of colorful metal disks dance in the wind to create a melody and a visual buzz, evoking the leaves of trembling aspen. This sensory experience seeks to highlight the simple beauty of the forest. Visitors will be encouraged to interact with the curtains and contribute to the movement of "leaves" that will move in the space. There is a dynamic in nature that remains invisible and this installation will invite people to explore and see what has always been there. Meaghan Hunter is landscape architect intern who also has a degree in environmental design. Her creativity and eclecticism has led her to architecture, urban design and landscape architecture, where ecology, environmental management, engineering and the arts meet. Suzy Melo holds a Masters in landscape architecture and a degree in environmental design. She is interested in the transition between interior and exterior spaces, particularly those heavily defined by built architecture. They are both working for landscape architecture firms in Winnipeg. Se mouiller (la belle échappée) by Groupe A / Annexe U [Jean-François Laroche, architect, Rémi Morency, architect and urbanist, Erick Rivard, architect & Maxime Rousseau, architect], Québec (Québec) Canada. The installation explores the discussion about invasive species and the delicate balance of ecosystems. Here plants will be kept in a kind of vise that visitors will be invited to enter. The plant will escape over the course of the summer. Loss of control? When what is beautiful becomes dangerous...the experience will be repeated as the garden invites visitors to engage physically with the garden. Gone is simple contemplation. The call to participate is also an invitation to interact and share in the common environment of the wetland. "Don your boots and get wet" offers a chance to discover a completely different space. Group A / Annexe U is an architectural firm from Quebec City that have developed a unique expertise in land management, urban planning and urban design. For the members of this multidisciplinary team, the participation of and interaction with the client and other stakeholders, are at the heart of every project. The sensitivity with which they approach each project and their creativity has contributed to the success of the firm, which has garnered them awards and made them finalists in many competitions.http://www.groupea.qc.ca. The Archipelago (An Atlas of Biomes) by Pedro Pitarch Alonso, architect, Madrid, Spain, received a special mention from the jury. All of the 309 entries are exhibited on-line on the website of the Festival as part of the annual exhibition of competition entries: http://www.internationalgardenfestival.ca. The jury was composed of Paula Meijerink, landscape architect, co-designer of Asphalt Garden, IGF 2003 et Shushu, IGF 2004; François Leblanc, architect, co-designer of Méristème, IGF 2014; Rosetta Sarah Elkin, landscape architect and assistant professor of landscape architecture, Harvard University, Graduate School of Design, designer of Tiny Taxonomy, IGF 2010-2014; Edith Normandeau, acting executive director, Association des architectes paysagistes du Québec and Alexander Reford, director of Jardins de Métis/Reford Gardens and the International Garden Festival. About the International Garden Festival The International Garden Festival is the leading contemporary garden festival in North America. Since its inception in 2000, more than 150 gardens have been exhibited at Grand-Métis and as extra-mural projects in Canada and around the world. Presented at Les Jardins de Métis, at the gateway to the Gaspé Peninsula, the Festival is held on a site adjacent to the historic gardens created by Elsie Reford, thereby establishing a bridge between history and modernity, and a dialogue between conservation, tradition and innovation. Each year the Festival exhibits conceptual gardens created by more than seventy architects, landscape architects and designers from various disciplines in a pristine environment on the banks of the St. Lawrence River. The International Garden Festival is presented with the financial assistance of many public and private partners: Canada Council for the Arts, Canadian Heritage, Canada Summer Jobs, Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, Tourisme Québec and Emploi-Québec. Economic Development Canada is the major partner in the development of the Landscape Laboratory project. About the Reford Gardens / Jardins de Métis A National Historic Site and Québec heritage site, the Reford Gardens / Jardins de Métis are an obligatory stop for all those visiting eastern Québec. Cultural space and tourist destination for over 50 years, the Reford Gardens is one of the most popular attractions in the Gaspésie region, providing visitors with experiences for every sense. Located on the banks of the St. Lawrence and Mitis rivers, they were created between 1926 and 1958 by avid gardener and plant collector, Elsie Reford. Hydro-Québec has been the lead sponsor of the Reford Gardens since 1999. The gardens will be open every day from May 30 to September 27, 2015. Children 13 and under are admitted free of charge.
With the participation of: Canada Council for the Arts Canadian Heritage Canada Economic Development
With the participation of: Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec Emploi-Québec Ministère du Tourisme