Short story: Edwards Gardens and the adjacent Toronto Botanical Gardens are free and beautiful.
You can wander, picnic, learn about bee hotels and kitchen gardens, photograph the flora, watch wedding parties come and go, and remind yourself that Toronto has an extensive ravine system, filled with burgeoning nature.
The site’s recent Master Plan and Management Plan gives the following historical background.
Rupert Edwards purchased the property in 1944, and then sold it to Metro Toronto Parks in 1955.
The Garden Club of Toronto established the Civic Garden Centre (a precursor organization for the Toronto Botanical Garden) in 1958. The Civic Garden Centre opened in 1962, located in the old Milne House which was then destroyed by fire that same year.
A new facility to house the Civic Garden Centre was designed by Raymond Moriyama and opened officially to the public in March, 1965. Two subsequent renovations to the original Moriyama building have resulted in the George and Kathy Dembroski Centre for Horticulture, Toronto Botanical Garden’s present-day Visitor Centre.
TBG’s gardens, located on its 1.8 hectare leasehold, opened in 2006.Edwards Gardens & Toronto Botanical Gardens Master Plan and Management Plan (2018), p. 5
Google Street View has been in parts of the Toronto Botanical Gardens … click / swipe the image below for 360° view. (Isn’t that neat?)
And the Toronto Botanical Gardens even has a library.
Toronto Botanical Gardens / Edwards Gardens is museum no. 28 in my #100museums challenge (see 100 Museums Challenge).