The Most Beautiful Sculpture Parks and Gardens in the U.S.

Located in New York’s scenic Hudson Valley, 58 miles north of Manhattan, Storm King Art Center spans some 500 acres. This outdoor museum is home to more than a hundred large-scale modern and contemporary art sculptures by artists such as Roy Lichtenstein, Henry Moore, Ursula von Rydingsvard, and Mark di Suvero.

Since part of the outdoor museum’s mission is to “to create a dynamic and unique place to explore art in nature,” its pastoral landscape that includes rolling hills, woodlands, lawns, and walking paths has been designed so that it enhances the art experience of visitors.

For more information: stormking.org

There are plenty of reasons to visit New Orleans, and the newly expanded Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden adjacent to the New Orleans Museum of Art is certainly one of them.

The garden is built around two picturesque lagoons and occupies about eleven acres of land where more than 90 works of art are displayed created by over 60 artists. Some of the highlights include Leandro Erlich’s seemingly gravity-defying Window with Ladder, Jean-Michel Othoniel’s Tree of Necklaces that features six glass and stainless steel necklaces hung from the branches of a tree, and Elyn Zimmermann’s Mississippi Meanders—a 70-foot long bridge (one of three in the garden) made from laminated glass, stainless steel, and aluminum supports inspired by color-coded maps of the Mississippi River from the 1940s.

For more information: noma.org

New England’s largest sculpture park and museum is located on the banks of panoramic Flint’s Pond, about 20 miles north-west of Boston. The 30-acre property was previously owned by businessman, avid art collector, and world traveler Julian de Cordova who bequeathed it to the town of Lincoln in 1930. De Cordova believed that art had the power to enlighten and promote self-improvement so he wanted his estate to be transformed into a public museum after his death. So in 1950, the DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum opened its doors.

Nowadays, you can enjoy the beautifully landscaped grounds and stroll among world-class art such as Jim Dine’s Two Big Hearts sculpture, Saul Melman’s Best Of All Possible Worlds, and DeWitt Godfrey’s Lincoln—a series of large-scale steel cylinders piled onto one another that measure 150 feet in length.

For more information: decordova.org

Spanning 105 acres, St. Louis’s Laumeier Sculpture Park is one of the first and biggest sculpture parks in the country. Its permanent collection includes 60 large-scale sculptures including Vito Acconci’s Face of the Earth #3 that depicts a jack-o-lantern face carved into the earth, Tony Tasset’s Eye—a 37-foot sculpture of a blue eyeball, and Mark di Suvero’s monumental steel installation Bornibus. The sculpture park also has plenty of trails and rolling lawns where visitors can stroll and relax.

For more information: laumeiersculpturepark.org

The biggest sculpture garden in the world at the Walker Art Center first opened its doors in 1988 and was fully reconstructed in 2017 with the help of environmentalists, curators, artists, and landscape architects among many others. It now spans 11 acres and is a beautiful example of sustainable landscape design, as well as home to a variety of plants and wildlife, and, of course, world-class art. 

Forty sculptures, some created exclusively for this public park, by artists from more than ten countries are on display here. The most prominent work of art is definitely Spoonbridge and Cherry by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen—a 52 by 30-feet sculpture of a teaspoon and a cherry located in the garden’s pond.

For more information: walkerart.org

Architecture fans come here to tour Frank Lloyd Wright’s Usonian house, Kentuck Knobb, but soon realize that there is a lot more on view that’s worth staying for. The hexagonal house, which was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2000, sits on a hill and has gorgeous vistas of the Youghiogheny Gorge and the estate’s sculpture garden located at the bottom of the hill. More than 30 works of art are displayed all over the property by modern artists such as Wendy Taylor and Sir Anthony Caro, making Kentuck Knob a must-visit destination for art aficionados. 

For more information: kentuckknob.com

Located between the East and West buildings of the National Gallery of Art, and within walking distance of the National Mall, this sculpture garden is a year-round cultural and leisure destination in the nation’s capital.

The six-acre park includes a fountain that turns into a ice rink in the winter and about 20 large-scale sculptures by some of the world’s most famous artists. Roy Lichtenstein’s House I is among the highlights where the artist uses illusionistic effects to recreate a three-dimensional house. Others are Roxy Paine’s Grafts glistening stainless steel tree, and Robert Indiana’s Amor, which is the Spanish version of his iconic Love sculpture, located in Love Park, Philadelphia.

For more information: nga.gov

The campus of Chicago’s Governors State University houses over 3,000 undergraduate students and about 30 sculptures located on more than a hundred acres of idyllic grounds.

Seeing Tony Tasset’s larger-than-life Paul sculpture depicting Paul Bunyan is just one of the works that make the trip 40 miles south from downtown Chicago worth it. Other highlights include Christine Tarkowski’s Working on the Failed Utopia—a 20 by 13-feet steel, rice paper, and fiberglass dome-like structure and Mexican artist’s Yvonne Domenge’s nature-inspired Windwaves.

For more information: govst.edu

When Harry and Peg Bradley purchased 40 acres of flat farmland in Milwaukee, they tasked landscape architects William Langford and Theodore Moreau with turning it into an English garden where Peg Bradley later installed the grand sculptures she had collected over the years.

In 2010, the Lynden Sculpture Garden officially opened to the public and has since become one of the must-visit outdoor museums in the country thanks to its impressive collection of sculptures by artists such as Alexander Archipenko, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, and Mark di Suvero.

For more information: lyndensculpturegarden.org

Glenstone Museum holds one of the most impressive and important private art collections of post-World War II art. Its founders, Emily and Mitch Rales, wanted the museum, which opened its doors in 2006 and underwent a $200 million expansion in 2018, to be “not only as a place, but a state of mind created by the energy of architecture, the power of art, and the restorative qualities of nature.”

The museum grounds now offers span almost 300 acres of meticulously landscaped grounds. Sculptures by world-famous artists such as Jeff Koons (whose floral Split-Rocket sculpture has a full-time horticulturalist looking after it), Richard Serra, and Tony Smith, are on display among the scenic meadows, forests, and trails in Glenstone.

For more information: glenstone.org