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Children's

Cool Bookish Places: Bookworm Gardens

Greg Zimmerman

Staff Writer

Greg Zimmerman blogs about contemporary literary fiction at The New Dork Review of Books and holds down a full-time gig as a trade magazine editor. Follow him on Twitter: @NewDorkReview.

Some cool bookish places are just so cool they make you ache. Bookworm Gardens certainly fits that bill. The park, located in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, a quick hour’s drive north of Milwaukee, is a theme park totally dedicated to children’s literature. The park has six “Gateways” organized by literary theme, including Woodlands, Animal Gardens, Memory Gardens, etc.

The park features more than 60 books, each of which is displayed in its own “stone book pillar” at the entrance to each Gateway. The books include children’s classics like The Giving Tree, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (my personal favorite), and Winnie the Pooh. Here’s a map of the gardens:

bookworm gardens

Admission to the park is free! The park is funded fully with donations and memberships.

A friend of mine visited this past weekend with his daughter, and gave the place a full ringing endorsement. “Talk about a place to get lost in books,” he said. “There was everything from scenes that are depicted in stories to interactive things like houses/barns and even a place to write a letter to the mouse called Twitch. It was the kind of place you can plan to pack a lunch and let your kid get lost all day in fantasy.”

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