Seattle Children's Hospital Opens Family Healing Garden Featuring Pavilion Crafted by PTSW Students

Photo courtesy of Seattle Children’s Hospital

A family healing garden at Seattle Children’s Hospital featuring a timber frame pavilion built by PTSW students in 2019 was dedicated Oct. 16.

The project was inspired by the Shute family, whose infant daughter Season Miracle Shute died at Seattle Children’s in 2014. 

“We needed this sanctuary that we are creating so badly, a healing space to wish, breathe and hope for our daughter’s safety through each procedure she endured,” the family wrote on their website. “We had to go through the brutal process of watching our sweet baby die and our lasting miracle from all of this is to create healing space for other families where it was lacking for ours.”

Located outside the intensive care section of the hospital, the garden features a reiki spiral walking path, benches, the timber frame pavilion, a water feature, large scale mosaic artworks, and plants known to be soothing and healing. 

“It will be an intimate setting where families and patients can literally catch a fresh breath as part of their hospital experience,” the family wrote.

The pavilion was built during a Timber Frame course at PTSW in Summer 2019 based on a design by Port Townsend-based Terrapin Architecture.

More information about the sanctuary project can be found at www.seasonofmiracles.org.