Famed Cherry Trees Coming to Lake Kittamaqundi Beginning with Arbor Day Ceremony

It’s not just the District of Columbia that offers the sight of cherry trees blooming on the shores of a signature body of water — soon this sight will be a must-see springtime stop in downtown Columbia, Maryland, where people can come to see cherry trees on  Lake Kittamaqundi.

Columbia Association (CA) will be hosting a planting ceremony on National Arbor Day — Friday, April 26 — at 5 p.m. at Kennedy Gardens, which is located on the east side of Lake Kittamaqundi. Three Yoshino cherries grown from the stock of the original Washington, D. C. cherry trees will be planted at the ceremony. These special legacy trees are a gift fromBlossoms of Hope. The local organization also donated 25 additional trees to the restoration effort at Kennedy Gardens, including  Kwanzan cherry trees, dogwood trees and redbud trees. CA will plant these and dozens more trees, shrubs and perennials at Kennedy Gardens later this spring

“We expect that the blooming cherry trees will be a beautiful sight from the plaza across the lake,” said Jan Clark, landscape architect with CA’s Bureau of Community Building and Sustainability.

Also featured at the ceremony will be selections from the Haiku for Hope art and poetry exhibit currently showing at CA’s Columbia Art Center. Haiku for Hope paired 45 paintings — many of which were related to cherry trees — with poems. Fourteen of those have been selected by Howard County Tourism to be reproduced on banners that will be shown at Kennedy Gardens.

The full Haiku for Hope exhibit continues at the Art Center through April 28.