A project that was years in the making was unveiled this week at the Clovis Botanical Garden, and this one needed a lot of green to grow.

About $2 million dollars’ worth of green, that is.

The new 2,460-square-foot Evert Family Visitors Center will give the volunteer-led Clovis Botanical Garden, located in Dry Creek Park on Clovis Avenue, a place to hold its committee and board meetings, showcase the arts and crafts of local artisans, provide science demonstrations for youngsters and gardening talks, Anne Clemons, president of the Clovis Botanical Garden’s Board of Directors, told GV Wire on Friday.

And since the center, designed by noted Fresno architect Arthur Dyson, has air-conditioning and heat, those activities can now be scheduled year-round, she said.

It’s been nearly 10 years since the volunteers first started talking about the possibility of building a visitor center and then decided six years ago to move forward with planning. Serendipity brought Clemons and other volunteers together with Dyson at a community meeting involving builders and contractors.

Fundraising Got a Big Boost

But Clemons still wasn’t sure how they would be able to afford to build what Dyson, known for his striking designs, would create.

The volunteers had scheduled a fundraiser for a hot summer day in the garden’s pavilion, but attendance flagged when temperatures soared to 103 that day. Clemons remembers feeling somewhat in despair, but it didn’t last long.

“The next my phone rang, and it was Art. ‘This is your architect.’ I thought, my God, I have an architect? And, he says, ‘Are you sitting down?’ I was in the car. ‘Yeah, I’m sitting down.’ He says, ‘We just got a donation for a million dollars.’ I started to cry.”

The donation initially was labeled as anonymous, but the secret came out at Wednesday’s ribbon-cutting when Sharon Evert wielded the ceremonial scissors and the official name, Evert Family Visitor Center, was unveiled.

Other donor names are sprinkled around the site, such as the Clovis Community Foundation patio and the Marge Largent Gift Shop.

Gift Shop, Landscaping Still Under Way

The gift shop is still a work in progress, but Clemons said the goal is to create a space where local artisans can display their wares, such as goat milk soap, paintings, ceramics, garden items, and more. And yes, there will be coffee and snacks for sale down the road, she said.

The patio may very well be Clemons’ favorite part of the visitor center:  “You can see all the plants from here,” she said.

It’s set out with tables and chairs and shaded by a vaulting V-shaped roof, the underside of which is layered in wood. The public can use the patio even when the visitor center is locked, so long as the garden is open.

The center opened minus its own landscaping, which should be completed within a few weeks, Clemons said. For now, yellow caution tape marks the outlines of where the new irrigation lines will be laid and plants installed.

The first event at the center occurred earlier in October when the nonprofit held its annual volunteer appreciation dinner, which normally would be held in September.

“We wanted their dinner to be the first event in here,” she said.

According to the construction schedule the center was to open by August, but it was delayed to October to provide time to build a nearby parking lot required by the city of Clovis. That lot is mostly used by volunteers and accessible through the north gate, and visitors who use the lot will need to depart before the garden closes and the gate is locked, Clemons said.

Many Gardens in One

Clovis Botanical Garden is actually a collection of gardens, including the Children’s Garden, the Sensory Garden, the Mediterranean Garden, the Cactus Garden. All are designed to showcase how water conservation gardens can thrive in the Valley and to give home gardeners some ideas about what their gardens can look like.

It started on one-acre at Dry Creek Park in March 2002 and then later expanded and now covers four acres.

Longtime volunteer Ree Coy said Friday that the opening of the visitor center is a “dream come true.”

“You think it’s never going to happen, and we watched it all, the progress of it, from laying the foundation to the actual inauguration and official opening on Wednesday, the 29th of October,” she said. “It’s just really wonderful.”