Pebble Hill Presbyterian Church Memory Garden
 
Memory Garden Design Concept:
Grief, Life, Remembrance

Spiritual and physical cycles are two of the most powerful forces in our lives. They are intimately connected to each other and are fundamentally united by life and death. The Memory Garden brings these cycles together to remember the lives of others and to reflect on our own fragile lives.

This addition to the physical and spiritual landscape of Pebble Hill Presbyterian Church seeks to unite ideas of
life, death and remembrance. The Memory Garden design operates on several levels. It provides an intimate, dignified and familiar place for remembering loved ones - a place where the living can remember and reflect on the lives of those who have passed before them. It seeks to use the cycles of natural order as a vehicle for exploring our own spiritual cycles.

The Garden is structured around a sequenced path and destination space. It moves you through a garden composed of three areas: Grief, Life and Remembrance. The first subspace, Grief, is a place to complete the life cycle by scattering the remains of loved ones. The second subspace, Life, provides open views to the surrounding landscape as a reminder of the possibilities remaining in this life. The final destination of this garden, Remembrance, is a sunken outdoor room, secluded and serene, as a place to remember the journey of life and death. It includes elements of the previous two spaces and introduces new elements to clearly delineate it as a place apart.

Symbolic elements abound in this garden. The path itself is suggestive of a stream in both form and materiality, evoking associations with life-giving water. Rocks are some of the ultimate symbols of eternal strength, and their changing form throughout the garden tell a subtle narrative. The circular shapes in the room speak of cycles, perfection and completion. This sunken circular room is enveloped by the earth, a means to be mindful of those who have been remembered here.
The design concept and original conceptual plans and sketches for the Memory Garden were developed by Jonathan Logan and Jonathan Peet as they completed their undergraduate education at the Landscape Architecture Faculty, State University College of Environmental Science and Forestry, Syracuse, New York.

Memory Garden Policies

Purpose
To provide a designated portion of the church property as a planned garden of beauty and dignity, for meditation and the use of church members and their families for the disposition of cremated remains of loved ones.
Use of the Garden
Present and former members of Pebble Hill Presbyterian Church and their families may use the Garden for scattering the ashes of loved ones. Services held in the garden should be simple and include only members of the family and close friends. A funeral or memorial service should be held elsewhere.

There shall be no memorials displayed within the Garden. A memorial plaque is available in the church.

No commemorative plants, bushes, trees, flowers or artifacts may be added to the Garden.
Memory Garden Book
A permanent book is available to record biographical information about those who are memorialized. Family members and friends may provide material for the book to help remember the deceased in some special way. When family or friends wish to remember those interred elsewhere, those names may also be included in the book.
 
Funding
Although there is no charge for use of the Garden, a Memory Garden Fund has been established to which gifts may be made for the purpose of perpetual care, including professional landscaping.
 
Administration
The Memorial Gifts and Endowment Committee is responsible for the Garden in consultation with the Session of Pebble Hill Presbyterian Church.

Approved by the Session: October 16, 2001

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