Completed in 2001, Halcyon Garden became the Mount Auburn’s newest innovative burial area.  The architectural firm of Reed Hilderbrand Associates received a Design Merit Award from the American Society of Landscape Architects in 2003 for the design of Halcyon Garden.

Converting a stretch of Maple Avenue along the Cemetery’s perimeter into a new interment landscape began in 2000.  Interments are located directly under the path and memorial options include recumbent ledger stones set in groundcover, granite benches or granite monoliths.

To create a wooded landscape, canopy trees, birches, redbuds, deciduous and evergreen shrubs and ground-cover plants were planted along the arced path with openings for occasional views from the path downhill to Halcyon Lake.  A Black Oak which predates the establishment of the Cemetery was left in place.

July 2000, work begins on Halcyon Garden

For more on the inspiration and design of Halcycon Garden read The Silent Edge by Allen Freeman in the June 2004 issue of Landscape Architecture.