Welcome aboard, folks. This is the Bicentennial Capitol Mall, built in 1996 for Tennessee's two hundredth birthday, and it was laid out like a giant arrow. Look up the hill to the south. That's the State Capitol, and this whole 19 acre park points straight at it. Now turn around and look north, down the long lawn. See where the grass suddenly drops away? There's a 2,000 seat theater sunk into the ground. They buried it on purpose, so an entire theater wouldn't block the view of the Capitol. That is landscape architecture: hiding a building in plain sight. Under your feet is a granite map of Tennessee, tilted a little so it reads right from Capitol Hill. At night, every county seat lights up. Past the railroad trestle, 31 fountains stand for the state's major rivers. And every tree and shrub in this park is native to Tennessee, including the tulip poplars down both sides, the state tree. Out of state plants need not apply.
Did you know
The park was designed by Tuck-Hinton Architects with the landscape architects Ross and Fowler, and it runs four tenths of a mile on one straight line. Landscape architects do love a straight line.
Two walkways run down the middle lawn and slowly spread apart as they go. Their 17,000 paving stones carry the names of donors. Watch your step, you're walking on a lot of very generous people.
Along Seventh Avenue, a granite wall 1,400 feet long tells the history of the state. That's nearly four football fields of reading.
600 James Robertson Pkwy, Nashville, TN 37243 · Sources: The Cultural Landscape Foundation: Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park