The city unveiled what might be a first for Santa Clarita during an unseasonably beautiful afternoon at Duane R. Harte Park Tuesday – a meditation garden.
City leaders gathered for the garden’s ribbon cutting ceremony said the new space was special for a couple of reasons: First, it’d intentionally been sequestered to the back of the park, and second, it was designed with “drought-resistant” landscaping techniques in mind.
Santa Clarita Mayor Laurene Weste took the lead on introducing the city’s thinking behind the garden ahead of the big ribbon cut.
“(The park) is set away from the playground and the major paths where you will have reduced sound,” Weste said. “The meditation garden creates a sense of refuge and tranquility here in this quiet zone, (and) this designation emphasizes simplicity and balance, allowing the natural landscape, including the surrounding hillsides and mature oak trees, to take center stage.”
While the garden features no flashy waterfalls, it does have a solar-powered boulder fountain, along with some hearty-looking green tuft plants dotting the sides of the pathways.
The garden’s biggest feature is a looping gravel pathway that travels a short distance up a hillside at the very back of the park, densely shaded by nearby oak trees. Part of the festivities Tuesday featured yoga and tai chi demonstrations in the park’s gravel pits.
While Sarah Lowman performed tai chi on the left – encouraging park unveiling attendees to join in – Serenity Hot Yoga owner Annelie DeFazio made music on the rims of bowls while one of her studio’s students performed a yoga demonstration.
While there’s something to be said for the vibe a name can create, the meditation garden’s first hour of operation seemed to justify the choices that’d made it. Big oaks on either side blocked out sound and wind as many of the roughly 80 attendees sat down to listen to the sound of bowl rims being played.
Murali Nair, a former professor at USC’s school of social work who’s currently adjuncting remotely for Columbia University in New York, was excited for the new garden. He lives right across the street, he said, and was aware of the ongoing construction.
Nair might be an expert on the utility of these spaces: He teaches mindfulness at the Santa Clarita Valley Senior Center, and as a professor his work has often touched on what it means to live healthily.
“I was in Japan several times, you know, so when we they first (started) talking about (the mindfulness garden), I was thinking, ‘It’s like in (Japan),’” Nair said.
Nair keeps active in the neighborhood, and with another venue for secluded stretches, his neighbors – or his five grandkids – may stand a chance of catching up.
“I walk 15,000 steps in this area,” Nair said. “I always like (it), it’s beautiful.”
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