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KARE in the Air: Lyndale Park Rose Garden

The Rose Garden is the second oldest public rose garden in the United States, and showcases 3,000 plants in 100 different varieties.

MINNEAPOLIS — Our KARE in the Air summer series aims to give viewers a birds-eye view of Minnesota's most iconic and beautiful locations, courtesy of our drones and talented photojournalists. 

This installment takes us over a well-known garden planted over 100 years ago, established to prove you could grow roses in a cold climate like Minnesota.

The Minneapolis Parks and Recreation Department says the Lyndale Park Rose Garden was the vision of Theodore Wirth, and was completed back in 1908. 

Over the next few years, the gardens were gradually developed, but had not yet caught on with the public. In 1914, Wirth called the rose garden an inspiring scene, but lamented that it was “remarkable that only a small proportion of our population visits this ground, or even knows about it.” 

If only Mr. Wirth could see the park today. The Rose Garden is the second oldest public rose garden in the United States, and showcases 3,000 plants in 100 different varieties. There are some 62 different flower beds to wander through, and it draws thousands of admirers annually.

Typical blooms at the garden, sitting on 1.5 acres just off the northeast corner of Lake Harriet, usually hit their first peak in mid-to-late-June, but viewing remains spectacular through early October.  

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