Visit Brookgreen Gardens for Year-Round Displays That Celebrate Plants and Art

Unlike many public gardens, which usually have some origin in the display or conservation of plants, Brookgreen Gardens was inspired by art. Anna Hyatt Huntington was one of New York City's most prominent sculptors in the early 20th century. Her husband, Archer Huntington, an American philanthropist and scholar, purchased a vast property on the coast of South Carolina, initially as a retreat to allow Anna to recover from tuberculosis. However, Anna quickly felt inspired to utilize the space for her sculptures.

The property was the location of four former rice plantations: Laurel Hill, Springfield, Brookgreen, and the Oaks. They produced enormous quantities of rice and millions of dollars for the wealthy plantation owners. This was done by exploiting the labor of thousands of enslaved West Africans, who brought centuries of rice-growing experience to the area. The largest of the four plantations, Brookgreen Plantation, was one of the biggest rice plantations in the United States prior to the Civil War, and its proprietor owned more enslaved people than anyone in the country. Along with the sculptures and plants on display at the gardens today, the reality of the property’s history is preserved through educational tours and exhibits. To learn more about this history, check out this video: Tracing the History of Brookgreen Gardens.

When the Huntingtons purchased the property in 1930, the plantations had long been abandoned, and the land was being used as a hunting preserve called the Brookgreen Gun Club. Canals, built to flood fields and transport harvests by boat, naturalized over time with native grasses and trees that transformed the area into the Lowcountry landscape that can still be seen on the grounds today. It was the perfect location for the Huntingtons’ seaside getaway but also a place they strived to protect. On July 13, 1931, just 18 months after their purchase, the property was registered with the state of South Carolina as the not-for-profit Society of Southeastern Flora and Fauna.

Related Article: Step Back in Time at Longfellow Gardens in Maine

When Brookgreen Gardens was established, Anna Hyatt Huntington already had a thriving career. The bronze Joan of Arc statue located in Riverside Park in Manhattan was completed by Anna in 1915 and is the first public monument by a woman in New York City. The initial thought for the gardens was to highlight only her large body of work, but the couple shifted their focus and expanded their vision. Brookgreen is now home to the biggest and most comprehensive collection of American figurative sculpture in the country, displayed across the garden, three galleries and a storage and research facility. The collection consists of over 2,000 works by 430 artists, both historical and contemporary.

Some of the most notable pieces of art on display are:

Aside from the notable works of sculpture, acres of natural and cultivated plant beauty and relics of its turbulent history, Brookgreen is also well known for an incredible winter light display. Nights of a Thousand Candles started as a two-day event in 1999 and has grown into a celebration that spans from the end of November to the beginning of January. As the name suggests, the gardens are illuminated with hand-lit candles – more than 2,700 for their 2025 display – as well as thousands of traditional holiday lights. This creates dazzling effects on the plants that are still lush and vibrant in South Carolina during the winter months, while also casting the sculptures aglow in the warm light of the many candles, often set in floating holders in ponds and fountains.

I’ve spent a considerable amount of time talking about the man-made attractions at Brookgreen, but there are also many impressive plant collections to explore. The Huntingtons were just as dedicated to collecting, exhibiting and preserving the plants of the Southeast as they were the notable sculptures they acquired. The cultivated gardens in which the sculptures reside make up a fraction of this property, and a myriad of South Carolina native plants can also be found “Beyond the Garden Walls” in the thousands of acres of history and wildlife preserve that can be accessed by trails around the botanical gardens.

One of the most iconic elements of the gardens is the Live Oak Allée. Planted in the 1700s when Brookgreen was still four rice plantations, these 250-year-old southern live oak trees (Quercus virginiana) act as an informal entry to the gardens and are a lasting symbol of Brookgreen’s past and present. They are also naturally draped with lovely cascades of Spanish moss (Tillandsia usneoides), a plant that epitomizes landscapes of America’s Southeast as much as the live oak trees it often inhabits. During the Nights of a Thousand Candles, strings of lights are hung from the trees’ massive branches, creating the illusion of falling light and making this historic passageway extra ethereal.

Azaleas and their rhododendron relatives are some of the plants you’ll see frequently throughout the beds and borders at Brookgreen. A wide variety of species in an array of exciting bloom colors can be found in just about every garden on the grounds, but I would like to highlight the native mountain azalea (Rhododendron canescens). Also called the Southern pinxter or Piedmont azalea, this species thrives in the moist woodlands and swamps of the Southeast. What really makes this azalea stand out from the crowd is its unique, trumpet-shaped blooms with unusually long stamens that arch gracefully up and out. Bloom clusters take on some extra textural interest that make it worth keeping an eye out for.

Bald cypress (Taxodium distichum) is another iconic native tree that can be found throughout the gardens and often covered in Spanish moss. However, there are a few features that make these trees special. Unlike many conifers, bald cypress is not evergreen, and their needles will transform into a vibrant orange hue before falling at the end of the growing season. Bald cypress is also known for two characteristics that make this tree a little otherworldly. First, the trees have volleyball-like cones, which appear tough and green in autumn and become woody as the season progresses. A mature bald cypress will also start growing cypress “knees.” These are cone-shaped root growths that stick out through the ground around the base of cypresses. What is even more fascinating about these oddly shaped projections is that scientists have not been able to determine exactly why they form.

Another Southeastern native with some otherworldly characteristics is the blueflower eryngo (Eryngium integrifolium). This perennial can be found in the cultivated gardens as well as in its natural environments along the trails that cut through Brookgreen’s wildlife preserve. You might hear the buzz of happy insects before you spot this plant, as it is well-loved by pollinators, but the shimmery blue blooms are sure to catch your eye. The orb-shaped flowers have spiky bracts that give this plant tons of textural interest that is particularly enchanting in person.

A botanical garden in South Carolina’s coast would not be complete without a heaping helping of palms. None can be more signature to the gardens than the Sabal palm (Sabal palmetto), South Carolina’s state tree, and it’s on prominent display in the designated Palmetto Garden as well as throughout the grounds. If you’re able to visit the gardens on a quiet day, you might be able to hear the soothing sound of their large, evergreen leaves rustling in the wind. To get another taste of this plant’s incredible texture, keep an eye out for dwarf palmettos (Sabal minor) and saw palmettos (Serenoa repens), both of which can also be seen at Brookgreen.

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