Conservation & Restoration Projects
Restoration of King Street Gardens Park (Spring and Summer 2024)
Office of the Arts staff is working with a team to complete renovations to King Street Gardens Park. This includes upgrades to the existing lighting, landscape maintenance, trimming back of the main topiary, leveling uneven bricks, and providing native plants in the Sunken Garden, which help support more of a raingarden in this area.
- For the landscape design, staff is working with a team at Brightview (a City contractor) on the planting plan.
- To comply with the Visual Artist Rights Act, staff continuously consulted with the artists for the park (Buster Simpson, Laura Sindell, and the Seattle Team) on the plantings proposed by Brightview and incorporated their feedback on the proposal. Eventually, the team landed on a design that met all of the goals for the project.
- Staff has also worked to keep project stakeholders updated on the project, including the King Street Gardens Park Foundation, and ALX Dog Walk, who is a donor for landscape improvements within the Sunken Garden.
- Once the improvements are substantially complete, additional park identification signage and project signage are planned within the park.
For more information about this project please contact Meika Daus at meika.daus@alexandriava.gov.
Public Art Condition Assessments
Every five years, the Office of the Arts commissions a professional conservation assessment of the City’s Public Art Collection, which includes prioritization and budget estimates.
- In 2023, the City of Alexandria Office of the Arts hired Past Matters to evaluate the condition of City's public art collection. In Spring 2024, the assessment for the City-owned works was transmitted to the Alexandria Commission for the Arts. The assessment for privately-owned works is currently in progress.
- In 2018, the City of Alexandria Office of the Arts hired EverGreene Architectural Arts to evaluate the City's public art collection. The works of art include sculptures, murals, plaques, fountains, gardens/landscapes, community art projects, and other objects, including historic works. This assessment built upon the 2013 assessment in accordance with the approved Public Art Implementation Plan and Policy.
Each conservation assessment report outlines the condition of each work, during the year it was assessed, and includes photos documenting the condition, a condition description, condition determination (excellent, good, fair, poor, deteriorated), treatment recommendations, and the overall priority for treatment within the collection (low, medium, high) for each artwork.
The Office of the Arts uses the conservation assessments to develop a multi-year public art maintenance plan and budget. Updates and/or changes to the maintenance plan will be shared with the Alexandria Commission for the Arts.
For more information please contact Matthew Harwood at matthew.harwood@alexandriava.gov or Meika Daus at meika.daus@alexandriava.gov.