Hot Springs, Arkansas
Ritchie Smith Associates, in partnership with Behnke Associates, prepared a master plan for a new botanic garden for the University of Arkansas. Services included stakeholder workshops, programming, strategic planning, site analysis, design, and assistance with promotion and fundraising. The 210-acre site of the garden is heavily wooded and almost completely surrounded by a lake. The garden was planned to support multiple purposes, including student education, environmental awareness, passive recreation, and tourism. Among recommendations were making native plants of the region a focus and maintaining consistency in the design quality of all structures, the first of which were by Arkansas' AIA gold medal winner, architect Fay Jones.