About Us

Our Mission: Building Community, Celebrating Nature

Leach Botanical Garden offers immersive, restorative, and educational experiences in a unique landscape of native plants and horticultural collections to build community, celebrate nature, and inspire environmental stewardship.

Vibrant Environment, Thriving Community, Healthy Organization - View our Strategic Framework
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Situated along a free-flowing creek in outer SE Portland, the garden is an inviting, restorative urban greenspace. The Upper Garden features an entry plaza, aerial tree walk, four-season pollinator garden, and basalt stone sculptural installation. The hillside and lower garden feature native plants, historic Leach plant collections, meandering, wooded trails, and riparian area pathways along Johnson Creek.
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From Sleepy Hollow to Leach Botanical Garden

Sleepy Hollow sign at the lower entrance
The “Sleepy Hollow '' estate that John and Lilla Leach lovingly created and tended for over 36 years was donated to Portland Parks in 1980. Thanks to the newly elected Parks Commissioner, Charles Jordan, the estate was retained by Parks, and a grass-roots, non-profit organization was quickly formed to work in partnership with Portland Parks to care for the garden and ensure its future. 

The original 4.7 acre property has grown to almost 17 acres with adjacent land purchased over the years by Portland Parks. Leach Garden Friends works closely with Parks to ensure that the unique property remains a well-cared for gem that both serves and is treasured  by the larger community. Today more than 12 staff members along with a dedicated group of volunteers care for the property, offer events and  tours, handle garden maintenance, work to replenish native plant habitat, engage under served communities with hands-on learning, and provide visitor services to more than 30,000 people per year.
About John & Lilla Leach

Partnership with Portland Parks & Recreation

The partnership between Leach Garden Friends and Portland Parks has endured for 40 years. Portland Parks is now in the process of phasing out its pass-through funding of garden operations, necessitating the creation of an endowment for garden operations, and requiring an entrance fee for the first time in the Garden’s history.
land acknowledgement
banner image Ty & Chey
sleepy hollow image tamra tiemeyer