What Is It About Reflecting Ponds?

Why do I stop in my tracks every time I see a reflecting pond? Does the same thing happen to you?

Anyone who attended the 2016 Garden Bloggers' Fling, in the Twin Cities,witnessed the magic of the Como Park Conservatory water gardens. Likewise, reflecting ponds in communities around the world are often among the best examples of the "garden as art."

Whether it's the way the light reflects images of adjacent buildings, plants, trees, or other structures, or the shadows and reflections of the pond plants, themselves, reflecting ponds create magical dimensions and colorful scenes impossible to ignore.

Reflecting ponds sometimes seem borderline overwhelming in their complexity; other times, they're studies in the beauty of simplicity. Brilliant with bright color in spring and fall; graceful in summer and winter. Large pools that stretch around buildings in great expanses; and tiny ponds housing a few goldfish and some simple plants.

What they all have in common is the power to capture and reflect the world around them--sometimes intentionally and often accidentally--in great scenes that create, display, and inspire art. Whether you stand this way or that, or view from the top or the side, each movement creates a new kaleidoscope of awesomeness. Sometimes it's their construction, and the props and materials around them, that fascinate.

Here's a small sample of ponds I've enjoyed--at Como Park, St. Paul, Minnesota; Cabbage Town, Toronto, Ontario; Olbrich Botanical Gardens, Madison, Wisconsin; New Orleans Botanical Garden, New Orleans, Louisiana; Edison and Ford Winter Estates, Fort Myers, Florida; and my own backyard. Click on the images to access the Flickr library with descriptions of the gardens and locations.