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For Immediate Release 

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN TO HOST GROUNDBREAKING CEREMONY FOR JACK C. TAYLOR VISITOR CENTER 
Ceremony to be held at 10 a.m. on Feb. 27 

WHAT: Groundbreaking Ceremony for the Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center 

WHEN: 10 a.m., Thursday, February 27 

WHERE: Missouri Botanical Garden, 4344 Shaw Blvd., south St. Louis 

INFO: mobot.org/taylorcenter 

(ST. LOUIS) The Missouri Botanical Garden will host a groundbreaking ceremony for its new Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center at 10 a.m. on Thursday, February 27. 

The Garden announced plans for the new Visitor Center in October. This transformative project will enable the Garden to better carry out its mission and serve its nearly 1 million annual visitors, all while contributing to the revitalization of St. Louis. 

A world leader in research and innovation, the Missouri Botanical Garden’s mission is to connect people with plants and showcase the natural world, and the new Taylor Visitor Center will be a symbol of that mission by providing an environment that fully embraces the concept of sustainability and powerfully transports guests into the oasis that is the Garden. 

Construction on the Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center will be done in three phases. Phase 1 will be building the basic structure for the new Event Center portion of the Taylor Visitor Center. This phase is scheduled to be completed in October. It will not cause any disruption to activity that takes place in the Ridgway Visitor Center. 

Once complete, the new Event Center will temporarily become the Visitor Center as the Garden enters into Phase 2 this fall. Phase 2 includes the teardown of the Ridgway Visitor Center and the construction of the Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center. Phase 3, expected to wrap up in summer 2022, will focus on finishing the interior of the new Events Center. 

The Jack C. Taylor Visitor Center will open in summer 2022. 

The Garden will be open throughout the construction project and continue to host festivals and events. Visitors will always enter through a permanent structure. 

The February 27 groundbreaking will be attended by members of the Garden’s Board of Trustees, Garden President Peter Wyse Jackson, elected officials, including Mayor Lyda Krewson, County Executive Sam Page and Alderwoman Annie Rice, donors to the project, including the Taylor family, representatives from project builder Alberici, project architect Ayers Saint Gross, and from Michael Vergason Landscape Architects. 

For more information, including renderings of the Taylor Visitor Center, please visit mobot.org/taylorcenter 

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The Missouri Botanical Garden’s mission is “to discover and share knowledge about plants and their environment in order to preserve and enrich life.” Today, 161 years after opening, the Missouri Botanical Garden is a National Historic Landmark and a center for science, conservation, education and horticultural display.