Earth Sanctuary: A Nature Reserve, Meditation Parkland and Sculpture Garden

Laurie Clark recently wrote an essay for her University of Washington Environmental Psychology course, “The Human Experience of Place.”  Her essay reveals some of the design principles that we have used at Earth Sanctuary, including the use of repeating elements in plantings, textures and colors; the interplay of stone, trees and plants; and “mystery, the promise that we can learn more as we move through a space.”  She calls attention to the manipulation of particular views to increase the sense of depth and “make the observer feel as though he is in a different world.”  She says, “Earth Sanctuary is what Carr, Francis, Rivlin and Stone (from “The Value of Space,” in Public Space: Human Qualities of the Public Environment) define as a ‘meaningful space’ in that it allows visitors to make strong connections between it and their personal lives and the larger world.” 

I encourage you to read her essay in full.

There once was a man named Honi. He was walking along one day and saw a man planting a carob tree. Honi asked the man, “How long will it take for that tree to grow?”

The man replied, “Seventy years.”

Honi looked shocked as he asked, “How do you know that you will live another seventy years?”

“I don’t, but just as my grandparents and parents planted for me, I am planting this tree for the generations to come,” replied the man.

“Well fine,” said Honi, as he left. After walking for about an hour, Honi realized he was exhausted. He lay down on the dusty ground right next to a large rock. When he awoke, he was so shocked he had to pinch himself to make sure he was not dreaming. The dusty ground had become a large grassy field, and the rock was gone. In its place was a huge carob tree, towering over a glittering pool of blue water.

Honi walked back the way he had come, but he did not realize this was the way he had come. All of a sudden, he recognized his surroundings as the very place he had come from 70 years before. In the place where he had watched a man planting a carob sapling stood a towering carob tree. Honi realized then that he had been asleep for 70 years.

When Honi returned to town, nobody recognized him. He told everyone who he was and they didn’t believe him, but they were kind to the wise, old stranger.

Honi lived a full life, in which he choose to travel the Land of Israel planting carob trees for future generations.

Chuck, Thanks for trusting me to do the stone placement of the new stones at the Cottonwood Stone Circle. It is better than I could ever imagine. I know on some level that the design will work, but reality frequently trumps my imagination. After all the years I’ve been doing design, I still love the unexpected magic of the complete work. I love the way the physical presence of things move me and others in ways I cannot ever fully anticipate. These stones are far more than their size. It felt that they were not just standing from various vantages; they seem to leap from the ground. My heart was racing from their physical presence and from the way they seemed to bring everything in the area into sharper focus. They seemed to speak to the tree trunks in the background. The strong connection between the stones and the forest surprised me.

Forests will grow for eons with these stones as silent witness.

Thanks so much again for your trust. I believe this will be a fantastic year for Earth Sanctuary. It will be an incredible year for children. Their boundless energy will fill the site. That’s the tipping point I feel we reached yesterday. I could see it in your smile that spread across your face, a smile that comes from the happiest times of childhood, of a heart unburdened. That’s the energy that’s spreading through the Earth Sanctuary today.

Dan

The great French Marshall Lyautey, once asked his gardener to plant a tree. The gardener objected that the tree was slow growing and would not reach maturity for 100 years. The Marshall replied ‘In that case, there is no time to lose; plant it this afternoon.” – JFK

Chuck Pettis explains his motivation for creating Earth Sanctuary.

I have a passion for old-growth forest and am committed to filling the Earth Sanctuary property with thousands of conifers that will grow into giant trees in the next 500 years. -Chuck Pettis