Seoul is getting a $33 million 'sky garden' with over 24,000 plants

Leanna Garfield Mar. 8, 2017, 11:33 AM

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The South Korean capital of Seoul will soon get a massive urban garden that rivals the High Line, New York City's famed elevated park.

Called the Skygarden, the project will turn an abandoned overpass into a lush public park with over 24,000 plants. In 2015, the Dutch architecture firm MRVDV won a competition launched by the city to design it. Construction of the estimated $33 million garden (funded by the local government) started a year later.

MRVDV spokesperson Isabel Pagel now tells Business Insider that the Skygarden is nearly complete, and will open on May 20, 2017.

Check out what it will look like below.
Seoul's Skygarden will wind around buildings and stretch 3,000 feet long in the city center.\

The garden will go up on a portion of an abandoned highway built in the 1970s. In 2006, the city shut it down due to concerns about its structural integrity.

Visitors will be able to access the 55-foot-high park by stairs at specific points.

It will feature 254 species of local trees, shrubs, and flowers, including maple trees and cherry blossoms.

They will be arranged in alphabetical order so visitors can easily identify and learn about each one.

The project "can inspire further additions to the area’s greenery and public spaces, and will connect the Skygarden to its surroundings both physically and visually through plant species related to each of the neighborhoods," the firm said in a press release.

Throughout the Skygarden, there will also be vendors that sell tea, a number of plant sculptures ... , street food markets, and flower shops.

Evergreen conifers trees will grow in winter ...... and rhododendron in the summer.

In the evening, lights will make the park glow. The flora will continue to the street level, too. It's bound to make Seoul look even more green.