Sean Gasser
Louisiana Lights, at Burden's Windrush Gardens in Baton Rouge.
Upon stepping through the doors of the LSU Rural Life Museum into the first warm glimmers of the new “Louisiana Lights” display, you might glimpse several oaks, each swathed exquisitely in strands of lights shifting slowly from soft white to multi-colored hues.
These tree-wrapped lights displays will be some of the last visitors will encounter on the mile-and-a-half tour through a radiant winter wonderland of illumination across Steele Burden’s Windrush Gardens—a deliberate decision to offer a different kind of experience for viewers, one inspired by the formal gardens and their rich history.
“We didn't want just another light-wrapped tree garden,” said Jeff Kuehny, director of the LSU AgCenter Botanic Gardens.
For instance, the giant live oak draping the gateway to the exhibition will be hung with thirty-five Moravian stars, dazzling visitors as they walk beneath a shimmering starlit canopy. Other trees throughout the gardens will be up-lit for visitors to admire.
Opening November 29 and running almost through the end of December, Louisiana Lights promises a new, immersive holiday experience for visitors to Burden Museum and Gardens, long a cultural touchstone and attraction in the greater Baton Rouge region.
Kuehny, a key figure in making the display a reality, said plans have been in the works for four or five years as Burden leaders wondered how to showcase the gardens during the winter months when flowers and trees aren’t in bloom. At the time of writing, he estimates about one hundred people have contributed to bring the light show to life.
Sean Gasser
The display from Burden Gardens' new holiday installation, "Louisiana Lights".
Bill Stark, the director of the LSU Rural Life Museum, hopes the luminous attraction will draw people from across Louisiana, and as far as east Texas and Mississippi, making it a key destination for the season. There will also be phases to the project, with additions in the coming years to enhance the show and keep it fresh.
“This is going to bring in a whole new group, a new generation of people being introduced to Windrush, in particular, in a new way,” said Stark. “We're really excited about what this is not only going to mean for the property, and Burden Museum and Gardens, and being able to support and maintain the Windrush Gardens, but also what it's going to mean for the community.”
Steele Burden, the youngest of the Burden family and a self-taught landscape architect, designed the gardens across several decades as different “rooms” that the Burden team has creatively and seasonally named for the lights display. Some of those whimsical titles include the “Oscillating Orchard,” “Prismatic Parterre,” and “Radiant Rondelle.” Other transitional spaces that evoke a more natural landscape, such as the “Holiday Hallway” and the “Enchanted Forest” will be lit to captivate and delight as visitors cross from one setting to another.
There will also be aviary ornamentation—in honor of Steele’s pigeonnier—with over one hundred fabricated doves dangling from an oak near his garden shed; a thirty-foot Christmas tree made entirely from lights and ideal for family photos; a decorated gazebo overlooking a water feature; and music, programmed in time to the lights, throughout the display.
Toward the end of the experience, viewers will have a chance to stroll along a lakeshore and admire lights artistically placed atop islands that will be fully visible and free of bramble for the first time in almost three decades, according to Kuehny.
Sean Gasser
Louisiana Lights at Burden's Windrush Gardens in Baton Rouge.
The exhibition ends at the Burden family house, where LSU students from the School of Music will be performing. A food and beverage station will allow visitors to rest as children run and play with the giant Christmas baubles dotting the lawn. Designed with all ages in mind, the walk won’t tax young children or the elderly; the route is even stroller- and wheelchair-tested.
“It is very responsive to the environment,” Stark said. “And in being responsive to the gardens, it's both fun, but also has a little bit of elegance to it too—but a very accessible element of elegance.”
Louisiana Lights will be open Thursday through Sunday, from November 29–December 29 starting at 5:30 pm. lsuagcenter.com.
