Heritage & Habitat Area at Plymouth Cider Mill

Anishnabeg Country, Plymouth, Michigan, USA

The Brief

Our brief was to transform an old (and pretty sad) petting zoo attraction at this very popular apple orchard into something ethical, sustainable, dynamic, and commercially attractive. 

Each autumn in this part of the United States, apple orchards open up to the public offering seasonal cider (apple juice), doughnuts, wagon rides, straw bales, chrysanthemums and animal attractions. It’s a cultural ritual, harvest celebration - and a big, perhaps sentimental, seasonal event attracting thousands of customers. 

We embraced this cultural tradition but were also given permission to go outside normal Michigan agricultural aesthetics and come up with something bold, outstanding, and different. We had a year to come up with an agreed design and one summer to install. It had to be ready in time for the new cider season and the thousands of visitors. 

Find out more about Plymouth Orchards & Cider Mill at their website.

Challenges

• Large-scale site transformation
• Level changes and drainage
• Challenging petting zoo culture 
• Offer shade, safety, and interest
• Creating high attraction area 
• A context of popular seasonal business

Design & Implementation

Bridget, Bede, and Charlie consulted widely, with ecologists, and zoo and animal care experts. We knew we needed big strong fences so we searched for fences we liked, and it was the curved, vertical ones using non-standard materials that drew our interest. Animal experts helped us include designs for fodder, shade, and enriched experiences: groups of rocks & logs, mounded areas, animal forage trees.

The design progressed and we communicated back and forth with the owners and managers at Plymouth Orchards until we had an agreed upon design. Bede's great drawings helped us communicate this complex and unusual design.

Work started as soon as the weather was good enough. Earthworks were first including drainage systems, soil levels, and pond excavation, followed by the construction of the elaborate fences. Then planting and mulching. So much mulch! We didn’t use grass as it would not be durable enough with all the foot traffic. It also meant that the animal areas and the human areas had the same ground treatment. 

The big summer of work was rounded off with lots of Xjeuching and framing some community education communications for the public about this project. Based on this, soon we were to hear from the Arab American National Museum regarding possibly doing a project there.

Curious about 'Xjeuching'? Check out our blog post The Power of 'Zhuzing'.

Learn more about our work on Al-Hadiqa Heritage Garden at the Arab American National Museum.

Ideas in Action

• Public attraction
• Playful and safe space
• Wildlife habitat

• Bold aesthetics
• Farm animal heritage
• Celebrate heritage and habitat
• Model respectful relations with other than human life.

Outcomes

We did it with just hours to spare. Mulch was still being spread and shade sails were going up the evening before opening! All that we intended came together, advanced shade trees, shade sails, new bridges, heritage animals frolicking in enriched habitat, humans walking into spaces very similar to those for the animals...

Two memories stand out: Firstly, as the curved timber upright fence came together it was even better than we had envisioned! The bold design paid off. At any one time hundreds of people could be seen in this now uplifting space. Secondly, we had transformed a former grassed drain into a beautiful pond with frogs, dragonflies, butterflies and surrounded by pollinator plants. A group of young school students cross the newly rebuilt bridge, exclaiming, "Look frogs!" and "So many dragonflies!"

“A complete transformation. It was a challenging project but now it's a real attraction here at our orchard. Great to see the farm visitors enjoying it so much.”

Mary Emmett

Owner, Plymouth Orchards & Cider Mill

Plymouth, MI, USA

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