McKee Botanical Garden's Waterlily Celebration: What You Need to Know

The 21st Annual Waterlily Celebration at McKee Botanical Garden is one of the most genuinely spectacular mornings you can spend in Indian River County, and if you haven't made it a tradition yet, this is the year to start.

Set on eighteen acres of subtropical hammock along U.S. 1 in Vero Beach, McKee is a survivor. It opened in 1932 as McKee Jungle Gardens, a roadside attraction built by citrus baron Waldo Sexton and businessman Arthur McKee, with the ponds, streams, and winding trails laid out by William Lyman Phillips, the landscape architect trained in the Olmsted firm who also shaped Fairchild Tropical Garden and much of Florida's public-garden landscape. At its mid-century peak it drew more than 100,000 visitors a year. Then the interstate rerouted traffic, the gardens closed in 1976, and most of the original acreage was sold for development. What you walk through today is the piece the community refused to lose: rescued by the Indian River Land Trust and re-dedicated as McKee Botanical Garden in 2001, and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Knowing that history changes how the water looks.

The waterlilies are the reason the crowd comes. McKee holds one of the largest and most respected aquatic-plant collections in Florida, including 51 varieties recognized by the International Waterlily and Water Gardening Society as a Certified Collection of Excellence. That is not a marketing line, it's a formal, juried distinction, and McKee is one of only seven gardens in the world to earn it, in company with historic names like Latour-Marliac in France and Bennetts Water Gardens in England. Standing at the pond's edge on a summer morning, you can see exactly why: pads the size of platters, blooms in white, magenta, sunset gold, and improbable blue, some tropical varieties opening only in the cool of early day.

Arrive early, and we mean it. There's a narrow window each morning when the light is still soft, the fragrance hangs over the water, and the blooms are at their most open before the midday heat. It's brief, and it's the kind of thing that makes people come back year after year. Miss it and you're still getting a beautiful garden; catch it and you'll understand why people set alarms.

Beyond the blooms, the day fills with things to do. Plein-air artists set up easels along the historic ponds and paint in real time. Aquatics expert Nikki Wojtowicz runs live repotting demonstrations for anyone who wants to start or expand a home water garden, and specialty vendors, aquatic plants, handmade goods, air plants, set up across the grounds. The Waterlily Photo Contest is a highlight in its own right: dozens of amateur and professional photographers submit each season, and the winning images are displayed in the historic Hall of Giants. That building is worth the walk on its own. Waldo Sexton built it as what's often called the first permitted, engineered bamboo structure in the country, and it shelters "The Board", a single 35-foot slab of Philippine mahogany he turned into one of the largest one-piece tables in the world.

This year's celebration runs Saturday, June 13, from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Regular garden admission applies, and McKee members get in free. Parking, membership, and full details are available directly through McKee Botanical Garden at mckeegarden.org. If you entered the photo contest, your submission window has already closed, so now you just get to show up, find your favorite pond, and enjoy the morning.

Ava Cook
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