Site-Specific Installation

Embrace, created by installation artist, Alison Stigora during UP Lift: Collaborations with Nature at Bloedel Reserve, was built in collaboration with our community of Staff, Volunteers, and Visitors.

Located past the Sheep Sheds, Embrace is an immersive space at the edge of the forest, designed to encourage contemplation. Encased in moss and built incorporating integrated benches made of western red cedar, the finished sculpture is 8 x 11 x 10 feet and remains in situ at the Reserve for several months.

Read more on Alison’s website: https://www.alisonstigora.com/projects/embrace

Embrace is a site-specific installation by Alison Stigora, created for Bloedel Reserve. Stigora was a creative resident at Bloedel in 2023 and during her time here was impressed by the relationship between wild and unwild in the gardens. The nature of every garden is a constant negotiation between what we allow to grow wild, and what we choose to guide and control. There are areas in Bloedel where you see highly manicured gardens, and areas like the bird marsh that are more wild. Yet in all of these, there is a relationship between human intervention and nature “doing its thing”. When you first approach Embrace, you may not initially notice it because it blends so well with its surroundings. Out of the corner of your eye it might appear like an erratic boulder covered in moss. When you get closer, however, you notice that there are intentional edges and curves. When you walk around it and see the interior, it is immediately clear that it is a human structure. A variety of living mosses, commonly found in the Pacific Northwest, are planted across the exterior, and continue to grow “wild”.

Underscoring the heart of Bloedel Reserve, Embrace is a contemplative space for viewers to pause and experience respite in nature. The curve of the piece is taken from the Fibonacci spiral, prevalent in natural forms such as the fern, nautilus shell, or pinecones. You may notice the downward arc of the spiral suggests the form is either growing down into the ground, or up from it. When you sit in the sculpture, this form suggests the feeling of being rooted or grounded in nature. Unique sonic qualities of the architecture amplify the sound of wind in the trees, calls of birds and frogs, and your own voice. The space becomes an invitation to consider the relationship between humans and nature, and our place in it.

Embrace was created in partnership with Bloedel Reserve’s Horticulture & Design team, particularly Gardens West Manager, Darren Strenge, and Senior Arborist Ken Little, and over 100 volunteers who assisted in prepping and planting the moss. All the moss was found on the grounds of the Reserve, much of it being harvested from the sheep shed roofs, and there are dozens of species used in the artwork. The moss is attached to the sculpture using pointed twigs, and below the moss is a mesh substrate, like a shallow planting tray, that is filled with coco coir soil and covered with burlap. The burlap and soil give the moss something to cling to. Eventually the moss will take root into this surface and the twigs and burlap will decompose.

The structure and bench are constructed from Western red cedar, which was milled locally at Smyth lumbermill in Poulsbo. When you sit on the bench inside the sculpture, the “doorway” opens onto a view of a sweeping Western red cedar above the Buxton Bird Marsh and Pollinator Meadow, uniting two experiences of this important native tree, both in a living state and carefully transformed for human use.

-Alison Stigora