WEEKEND: DAY FOUR - SECTION TWO
Updated: Aug 18
WALKER WALK
RECOMMENDED TIME WINDOW: 9:00am - 10:00am WALKING DISTANCE: ~.5 Mile
Personal car users: You can park in the Sculpture Garden parking lot to the west of the garden for a small fee. If that’s full, there’s also the Vineland Place Ramp just to the right of the Walker Art Museum. And if you’re lucky, you can snag street parking close by, but I wouldn’t count on that. If you’re up for a walk, there’s parking on Groveland Terrace that runs behind the Walker and into the neighborhood to the west. Read the following when you park and before entering the Sculpture Garden:
DRIVE 9:00am - 9:30am
Once in our Rideshare car, take a gander at the following before we get dropped off at the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden.
This drive should be a short 15 minute-ish ride.
The Minneapolis Sculpture Garden is an 11-acre park just to the southwest of downtown Minneapolis. It was opened in 1988. The main draw, the art centerpiece, is the Spoonbridge and Cherry sculpture, one of the top, if not THE top, icons of Minneapolis.
Designed by husband and wife Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen, it was constructed in the years 1985 to 1988. With a fountain feature spouting out of the top of the cherry stem, the water gives the cherry a bright, shiny sheen. This sculpture makes for a perfect photo spot with downtown Minneapolis in the background.
The garden has 40 permanent art installations, plus several temporary works that come and go.
In 2017, a massive renovation occurred, dispensing of a more formal garden feel and opting for a more natural prairie grassland look. This is when another notable sculpture was put in, the Hahn/Cock blue cockerel by Katharina Fritsch, nicknamed The Blue Rooster.
It is part of the Walker Art Center, which is across the street. The museum requires a fee to enter, but the garden is free!!
Once our Uber/Lyft drops us off at the southern tip, stop at the top of the steps just outside of the trees and across from the Walker’s main entrance.
MINNEAPOLIS SCULPTURE GARDEN 9:30am - 10:00am
I suggest spending about 30 minutes meandering around and checking out all the whimsical and insightful sculptures. Start going back and forth in this more wooded southern area, and then when we get out into the open grassland parts, harbingered by the famous Spoonbridge and Cherry, do a clockwise spin around the rest of the park.
End at the foot of the stairs leading up to the Irene Hixon Whitney Bridge on the east side of the park that goes over I-94.
Enjoy the garden!!!!!
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