It looks like a wedding cake made of light. The Jewel Box, Forest Park’s 1936 Art Deco floral conservatory, rises from its reflecting pools in tiers of glass — a radical design in its day, built with Works Progress-era craftsmanship and still the park’s most photographed building.
Inside, the city’s florists stage rotating floral shows through the year — chrysanthemums in fall, a poinsettia wonderland in December, lilies in spring — in a balmy green world that smells like a garden party even in January. For families it is the perfect Forest Park pause: warm, gorgeous, sized for short legs, and surrounded by lily ponds and the park’s lawns.
Admission is a token dollar or two — pocket change for a jewel.
The Jewel Box is in Forest Park at Wells and McKinley Drives. Hours at stlouis-mo.gov.
