Rooted in place, shaped by community, and centering care, Tree Care celebrates and expands the community of care between urban trees and their human neighbors in Hyde Park through a series of public workshops and gatherings, textiles, and sculpture.
Find out about the trees that live among us, about how they care for us and how we can care for them, about the community organizations working to preserve and plant trees, and about how you can join in with this project.
Tree Care Hyde Park is a series of community gatherings, plant-dyed and printed textile tree tags, and a mobile printing/planting press in the form of a wheelbarrow. Hyde Park’s tree canopy improves air quality, provides wildlife habitat, reduces heat, mitigates stormwater flooding, and creates an urban community that is joyful, peaceful, and beautiful. But Hyde Park is losing tree canopy faster than any other neighborhood in Boston. And the urban tree canopy is not equitably distributed.
Tree Care Hyde Park shines a light on the work of community and civic organizations and individuals who are working to protect and conserve our urban trees.
Tree Care Hyde Park celebrates and partners with local community organizations working to plant and preserve trees in Hyde Park. Together we will tag 1000 trees throughout Hyde Park; as residents walk their dogs, commute to work, relax in their local parks, they will encounter the brightly colored, plant-dyed textiles tags that are printed with short texts in the form of multi-sensory invitations to get to know and commune with our tree neighbors. The tags include a link to a website with information about the trees, Hyde Park’s urban canopy, and how our community organizations are increasing our tree canopy.
The Trees of Hyde Park
Maple, oak, black cherry, birch, elm, crab apple, and willow—the urban trees of Hyde Park are our neighbors. Tree Care Hyde Park invites residents to get to know these tree neighbors better through 1000 colorful, plant-dyed textile tree tags printed with ink made from the trees.
Do you want to find out more about a tree you found on your walk? Check out the tree care information at the Field Guide to Hyde Park Trees.
Tree Care Sites in Hyde Park
Tree Care Hyde Park tags trees in sites around the neighborhood that community organizations and the city are protecting, preserving, and caring for. These include urban wilds (existing and hoped for), a community land trust, city parks, contested microforests, streets, and more.
Wander through the map to find landscapes and trees that are on your way to work, where you can walk your dog, or where you can simply be in a peaceful, protected natural habitat.
Join
Tree Care Hyde Park includes a series of public programs and workshops open to the community along with a mobile printing/planting press—together this work will invite community authorship into the project inspiring Hyde Park residents to understand and advocate for the vital role trees play in urban communities.
Workshops: During the workshops, community members are invited to hum, breathe, move, whisper, and dream with the trees, to write invitations to the trees to join us in our everyday lives and our dreamd about what trees are and hope for. We will choose some short phrases to print on the textile tree tags using the Tree Care Printing/Planting Press. Community members can choose to take the tags and hang them on trees in their yard, neighborhood, or park.
Tree planting: Join Tree Care Hyde Park in planting trees in our parks and neighborhoods, particularly in low canopy neighborhoods, find out how to get trees planted in your yard, or receive a free tree in a Tree Giveaway with Tree Boston and Keep Hyde Park Beautiful.
Community Tree Equity Work
Hyde Park’s network of urban landscapes have been or are in the process of being advocated for, cared for, and conserved by local community organizations in Hyde Park, such as the SouthWest Boston CDC Green Team, Keep Hyde Park Beautiful, The Neponset River Association, and more. Boston is expanding and protecting Hyde Park’s urban canopy through the city’s recent Urban Forest Plan and other efforts.
Field Guide to Hyde Park Trees
Tree Care Site Map
About the community organizations
About the project
Tree Inks
Scores