Mt Auburn Greenhouse Breaks Ground Designed by William Rawn Associates

Watertown, MA – Mount Auburn Cemetery’s Board of Trustees, Consigli Construction Co., Inc., William Rawn Associates and officials from Watertown and Cambridge recently gathered to break ground for Mount Auburn Cemetery’s new greenhouse at the project site in Watertown.
Mount Auburn Cemetery is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and designated as a National Historic Landmark.
Replacing an existing 41-year old facility, the new greenhouse will greatly reduce energy demands while improving the cemetery’s ability to propagate historically and ecologically appropriate plantings for its nationally significant landscape. Among the new facility’s features are open-roof venting, computerized climate controls, and an underground 30,000 gallon cistern for collecting water off the greenhouse roof to be used to irrigate the plants propagated inside.
Construction will begin with the demolition of a small house, once occupied by the cemetery’s gardener, and its existing greenhouse facility, both located along Grove Street in Watertown. The construction of the new greenhouse will begin later this summer and the project will be completed in December of this year.
Construction of the new greenhouse is the first phase in the Mount Auburn Cemetery’s long term vision for a new Horticulture Center that will include classroom and community meeting space, new offices for the cemetery’s horticultural staff, and expanded facilities for its growing volunteer program.
Designed by the Boston architectural firm of William Rawn Associates, the center is targeting the highest level of certification (Platinum) from the LEED program of the U.S. Green Building Council. Sustainable initiatives will include geothermal wells and photovoltaic systems.