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Sleep-deprivation has a way of working on you. Nine 4-days-long “weekends” of the inaugural Gulf Coast Chinese Lantern Festival, plus the daily work involved in keeping Bellingrath Gardens & Home open to the public and looking at its best, took a toll, but we survived and we’ve emerged as a stronger and even more seasoned organization. Our thanks go to you, plus the 40,000 other guests, who attended this inaugural event! We also thank Tianyu Arts & Culture for placing faith in us as a nonprofit organization to partner with them and host a Chinese lantern festival. Initial plans are already afoot for the 2026 show, and we ask you to make sure to book your calendars with the start and end dates of April 16 and June 21, Thursday through Sunday nights, in 2026!
Because of the success of the Gulf Coast Chinese Lantern Festival, several projects are either underway or have recently been completed. We hope you notice some of these projects as you continue to visit Bellingrath, although some, admittedly, are located in non-public spaces. One of these projects was a $26,000 replacement of the worn-out steel fence and automatic gate opener located to the south of the Admissions Building. This new fence and gate, 8’ tall to exclude plant-hungry white-tailed deer, is up and working beautifully, we’re happy to report. Please note how it matches the other new fence and gate installed by the pet motel last year. Two other GCCLF-funded projects entail much-needed roof work on a couple of back service buildings: a $23,000 roof reseal and gutter replacement on the headhouse building that serves the Greenhouse Complex, and a $11,500 roof replacement on the Horticulture and Development Office Building. With these two roof projects underway, we will have rehabilitated roofs on four buildings over the past three years – the Boehm Gallery Building, the Security Building, and the two aforementioned ones! In Jeremy Schmidt’s article, you’ll also read about the greenhouse heating project, a major portion which was funded through the success of GCCLF. Bellingrath has also completed a $24,000 overhaul of our walk-in freezer that is utilized by the Café, a much-needed project for a critical piece of equipment that must operate in a zero-fail capacity. And lastly, coming soon you will see the first phase of improvements that we have planned for the interiors of the Admissions Building. We’ll be working on new flooring, painting, and wallpaper, with new countertops and other features to come a few months later. We think that all visitors will enjoy this much-needed refresh of Bellingrath’s front door, a building that everyone walks through, forming their essential first impressions of Bellingrath Gardens & Home!
Switching gears, I’m also happy to announce a major new benefit that we’re initiating for a couple of counties in neighboring Mississippi. Starting with this year’s celebration of Mr. Bellingrath’s Birthday, on August 9th Bellingrath Gardens & Home will be open with a $0.00 admissions charge for gardens visitors for residents of Jackson County, Mississippi and George County, Mississippi! Of course, residents of Mobile and Baldwin Counties will continue to receive free gardens admissions, as they have done for several decades on this special day. We feel that this increased geographic range represents a nod to our neighbors who have always considered Bellingrath to be “their” garden, just as much as have residents of Alabama’s two coastal counties.
With excitement for these accomplishments and so many others, we thank you, our patrons and members, and ask that you help us to spread the word about all things BGH!