Ahead of its fall reopening, Gilcrease Museum is asking Tulsans for their input on what the landscape surrounding the building should look like.
The museum hosted two sessions Wednesday to solicit feedback from community members on proposals. Chris Gates, a landscape architect who’s spearheading the project, presented a handful of ideas on how to reimagine the 24 acres surrounding the northwest Tulsa property.
“You want to see the museum sitting up on the hill … embedded within the landscape,” Gates said. “This was really about creating a network, a landscape … with the museum that isn’t about arriving at an institution.”
To make that vision a reality, museum officials are considering relocating parking lots, enhancing pedestrian pathways and integrating natural plants to create a more immersive experience for visitors. Other designs showed a diverse mix of prairie grasses, forest, meadows and savannah.
“We’re looking at this cohesively, trying to put together a plan that makes some sense, feels experientially rich and allows the existing buildings to kind of sing the landscape,” Gates said.
About 15 residents who attended the morning presentation said they wanted to keep green spaces mingled in with prairie grasses and gardens where kids can run and families can have picnics.
Amid questions on having enough parking and lighting choices, they wanted assurances that old-growth trees and some existing gardens would be preserved. Another key concern was protecting the view of Tulsa’s downtown skyline.
Gates said statues on the grounds would be placed in a sculpture garden. Renderings also show a sunset garden facing west to offer late‑afternoon views, connections to pathways and native plants.
Angela Swift, a neighbor to the property, said maintaining the trees around the historic Thomas Gilcrease House and mausoleum were her top priority. She said she often takes her grandchildren to play in the surrounding gardens.
“They want to come talk to Thomas,” Swift said. “They learned a lot about what the mausoleum is all about, and who is in there. As they’ve grown, they’ve learned about death through that, too.”
But the plans are far from completion. Once Tulsans have had their say, a project scope will be created so the museum can set targets and launch fundraising campaigns.
“We’re still trying to work out how to best support this landscape and the future iteration of Gilcrease for our visitors,” said executive director Brian Lee Whisenhunt.
Gates works for the New York-based Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, an architectural firm that is no stranger to Tulsa. It led a public process to design The Gathering Place more than a decade ago and its portfolio includes the George W. Bush Presidential Center and General Mills headquarters.
Ultimately, Whisenhunt said, the landscaping should reflect the heritage of the land as well as the American West and Southwest influence that the museum represents.
“We estimate about 60% of the collection is Indigenous or relative to Indigenous communities,” he said. “The Gilcrease Museum is located on the Osage reservation, and we have a close relationship with the Osage and their ideas and their feedback has definitely been incorporated into the design.”
