Few People Know There’s A Secret Indoor Rainforest Hidden In An Office Building In New York
If you find yourself craving the comfort of the forest while living in or visiting Manhattan, you may think that this desire cannot be satiated without going to one of the city’s largest parks or without leaving the city altogether. You’re wrong. There’s actually a beautiful forest that you can experience just a few blocks away from the United Nations. That’s not the only surprising thing about it, though. Besides being in the middle of New York City, this forest is inside an office building, where it has been happily growing since 1967. Read on to learn more.
The Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice was designed by world-renowned architects Kevin Roche and John Dinkeloo. It was commissioned by Henry Ford II to house Ford's non-profit, The Ford Foundation.
This building is 12 stories tall and has huge windows to let the light in. However, you might walk past it a hundred times and not realize that the indoor atrium is full of trees, unless you walk by at night and the inside is lit.
On this sign, you can read a bit about what you see here. This building used to simply be called The Ford Foundation Building, but it was renamed the Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice when it was updated in 2018.
Originally, this indoor forest had 37 trees, 999 shrubs, 148 vines, and 22,000 individual ground cover plants. Some have died and have been replaced over the past five and a half decades.
The glass roof is 160 feet from the forest floor. It lets light in so the plants can grow but some artificial light is also necessary to keep the plants alive and healthy. As you can see, most of the building's offices look out onto the forest.
It must be a lovely place to work every day. Fortunately, the atrium here is open to the public on weekdays during business hours. It's also sometimes open on weekends. You can visit the atrium and enjoy it at your leisure.
This hidden forest in the middle of New York City is a gem! Few people know that it exists but those who have found it love it and visit it often. You’ll love visiting the atrium at the Ford Foundation Center for Social Justice.
