How to Spend the Day at New York Botanical Garden with Your Kids

At 250 acres, the New York Botanical Garden is the largest botanical garden in the U.S. It’s also an educational institution and teaching center, and a fun way to take a “forest bath” in the heart of the Bronx—just 20 minutes via Metro-North from Grand Central Terminal. NYBG was founded in 1891, and today it boasts more than 1 million plants, spread across 50 gardens and collections. 

Must-See Exhibits at New York Botanical Garden

Permanent Features at NYBG

You can hike through an old-growth forest and get a glimpse into what once covered the entire region. You can scramble over a 14,000-year-old boulder, while your kid can try to squeeze through it. Everyone can, and should, stop to smell the many, many roses blooming in the eponymous garden. 

The Enid A. Haupt Conservatory looks like a “glass palace,” according to one young visitor. The historical glass building is divided into 11 different zones or regions, from the spiky cacti of the American Southwest to the verdant lush leaves in the Palms of the World gallery. NYBG’s outside gardens are a mix of careful landscaping and wild, native growth.        

A definite must-do for families is the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden. The fun begins at the entrance, as kids get to brush past several vertical streamers. Packed into the 12 acres are a playhouse, maze, discovery center (with hands-on activities), and lily pad-filled pond. Take part in a self-directed scavenger hunt, or time your weekend visit to catch a read-aloud or performance.     

KUSAMA: Cosmic Nature

While NYBG makes for an entertaining adventure year-round, currently on view are works by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama (through Oct. 31). One of the most famous artists in the world, Kusama was born in Japan in 1929. Her work is whimsical and approachable, relying heavily on primary colors and polka dots, bringing a playful, exuberant spirit to paintings, sculptures, and installations—and love of pumpkins—to NYBG. It’s a hard heart that won’t smile at an ancient tree wrapped in bright red-and-white fabric, for example, or a plump glittering pumpkin sitting stolid among sumptuous foliage. A mixture of old and new work, Kusama’s art feels tailor-made for the current moment, as the city starts to reawaken after the pandemic.    

  
Kids of all ages respond to the joyfulness at play in Kusama’s work, but they’ll especially enjoy frolicking beneath the “Dancing Pumpkin” (2020) in front of the conservatory, and posing near the vibrant “I Want to Fly to the Universe” (2020). Signage, with quotes from Kusama, help enrich the experience: “Forget yourself and become one with nature! Obliterate yourself with polka dots!” This earnest belief in the power of art and nature will affect even the most cynical of teens. 

You might find yourself talking about physics and/or eternity, thanks to the installation “Pumpkins Screaming About Love Beyond Infinity” (2017). Visitors enter a dark room, in the center of which is a box filled with differently sized, gradually illuminating pumpkins. The box is lined with one-way mirrors, so the pumpkins seem to extend in every direction forever. Beginning in August, NYBG will feature an all-new “Infinity Mirrored Room—Illusion Inside the Heart” (2020), an immersive installation in which visitors can see themselves alongside the pumpkins. (Special tickets will be required.)  

Temporary Exhibits at New York Botanical Garden

Mark your calendar for these temporary exhibitions at NYBG:

For the holidays, the botanical garden hosts the train show and a light show. The annual Holiday Train Show features model trains gliding past NYC landmarks made from twigs, leaves, seeds, and other botanicals. Generally, the New York Botanical Garden train show begins around Thanksgiving and runs a week or two into January.

NYBG GLOW, the botanical garden's light show, washes the garden in colorful, dazzling lights after dark.   

Postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Orchid Show promises to be bigger and better when it returns in spring 2022. The annual exhibition showcases—you guessed it—orchids, in all their delicate luminosity.

What are New York Botanical Garden’s COVID guidelines?

The New York Botanical Garden is open to the public with a variety of COVID-19 safety precautions, including face masks for all visitors (regardless of vaccinated status), timed tickets, social distancing and reduced visitor capacity, and frequent cleaning and disinfecting.