The Heartland Harvest Garden
Welcome to America’s largest edible landscape—where every tree, shrub, flower and groundcover is part of the story of where our food comes from. Here in the Heartland of America, this signature garden captures the spirit of Kansas City’s place where our rich soils and prime farmland make agriculture a shining star.
The Journey of Food from Seed to Plate
From seed to plate, the Heartland Harvest Garden is an adventure in learning in a garden designed to satisfy all the senses. As you explore the fruits and vegetables, grains and nuts and so much more you may often find yourself saying, “Oh that’s the plant where that (food) comes from!”
You will see a wide range of edible varieties from heirloom and modern to even some plants on trial for the future. Don’t forget to taste a sample of the garden’s produce at the Tasting Station. A visit to the Missouri Barn’s silo observation deck is a must, where you can overlook the whole garden and see its quilt patterns.
Heartland Harvest Garden Highlights
The Menu Garden is surrounded by a wattled fence of willows and dogwood and is comprised of four formal beds are rotated three times a year and filled with seasonal vegetables and other edible plants.
The main walk into the Heartland Harvest Garden passes right through the Seed to Plate Greenhouse. Housed in this area are seeds that have been sown and grown for transplanting into the garden. These greenhouses provide a jump start on production for some tender or slow-growing varieties and makes it easier to monitor small seedlings.
Arbors of grapes lined by roses and thorn-less blackberries lead you to the ornate entrance gates of the vineyard. A central walk bisects rows of grapes, ending at a wine cask fountain set under a beautiful rose and grape-clad arbor reminiscent of a garden in paradise.
Grapes for Every Purpose
Powell Gardens’ vineyard is not here to make wine but to display the marvelous diversity of grapes one can grow in Greater Kansas City. Each row has a different theme, beginning with purple, multi-use seeded grapes used for making jams, jellies and juice.
The last row shows the grape varieties used to make white wines in our region. Fifty of the best varieties of grapes for our region are on display and each row ends with a hybrid tea rose, which not only adds beauty and edible flowers to the landscape but also act as the “canaries in the mineshaft” to foretell any problems that may affect the grapes.
Beautiful Companions
Hyssop is planted beneath each row as a companion plant and adds to the charm with blue flowers in June and again later in the summer. Other companion plants include roses, lavender, chrysanthemums, blackberries, hazelnuts and redbuds.
Chateau Villandry outside Paris inspired this formal garden with a different pattern in each quadrant. Here vegetables and other edibles are planted three times each year for spring, summer and autumn harvest. The themes change annually so you will always see something different from year to year.
This produce was hand-selected by chefs in our Chef-in-Residence program.