Planting the Height of Dreams! Taipei City Expo Launches the Hollyhock Flower Sea Project

From March to May every year, the colorful and splendid hollyhocks on the landscape lawn of the Yuanshan Park Area of Expo Park dance gracefully in the breeze. In order to create a tall, gorgeous and magnificent hollyhock flower sea, the Parks and Street Lights Office of the Public Works Department has launched the Hollyhock Flower Sea Project and invited the public to take part in a planting experience activity. After a course on flower sea plants is given at the Urban Greening Environmental Education Center, participants will plant hollyhock seedlings together on December 14, in the hope that after being tempered by the long winter, they will bloom boldly once again next year!

Chairman Lin Chin-sung of the Xiliu Environmental Greening Foundation said that this year's hollyhock planting activity is themed "Planting the Height of Dreams." The idea behind the activity is drawn from the hollyhock's flower meaning, "dream." Hollyhocks are not demanding about soil, yet when in full bloom they blossom from bottom to top like a relay race, blooming without restraint, so that the slender stems are densely covered with large flowers. It is hoped that, like the hollyhock, people can hold fast to their dreams even in difficult circumstances and open up a sky of their own.

Lin Hsien-ta, director of the Yuanshan Park Management Office, said that the Yuanshan Park Area of Expo Park is conveniently located: take the MRT Tamsui Line to Yuanshan Station, and you arrive as soon as you exit the station. The activity venue is at the Urban Greening Environmental Education Center (formerly the Celebrity House), an quaint and elegant wooden Japanese-style building with refined and graceful garden scenery. There, participants can learn relevant greening knowledge in a uniquely styled classroom space and experience the fun of planting in the open flower sea landscape area. It is hoped that citizens and friends can join hands, adults and children together, to plant the seedlings of dreams, and it is looked forward to that next year everyone can stroll together through Expo Park and visit the seedlings they planted with their own hands to see how they are growing. In addition, citizens and friends who want to experience the "1214 Planting the Height of Dreams" hollyhock planting activity are welcome to check online and sign up, as places are limited!