The shifting beauty of “Butterfly Rest Stop” comes to Frisco’s Kaleidoscope Park

88.9 miles of twine and 791,788 knots make up Frisco’s newest public art installation. Designed by renowned artist Janet Echelman, “Butterfly Rest Stop” at the upcoming Kaleidoscope Park is a massive sculpture inspired by the annual migration of monarch butterflies through the North Texas area.

The sculpture, which is 165 feet in total length and 65 feet tall at its highest point, consists of a pair of flower forms that float in the breeze. Echelman took her inspiration for the design from the milkweed flower. Milkweed plants are the exclusive food source of monarch caterpillars, according to the National Wildlife Federation, and comprise some of the more than 3,000 plants Echelman notes will reside inside Kaleidoscope Park aimed at attracting pollinators.

“This artwork is inviting us to contemplate our interrelationship, our interdependence, with butterflies or pollinators and see the world through their eyes,” Echelman says. The artist is known for creating large-scale sculptural works in cities around the world. Upon learning about the butterfly migrations through the area in her research, she designed her piece to encourage pollinators to move through the park. “My goal is that the Kaleidoscope Park itself becomes a pollinator corridor,” Echelman says.

According to Echelman, the sculpture has been years in the making, with its inception dating to before the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, she says working on the joyful piece helped uplift her during the pandemic times.

She credits the support of the team of engineers at SOM and her studio team of architects and computer scientists with helping bring the ambitious piece to its completion. She explains that the sculpture consists of ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene fibers like those used in tethering the Mars Rover. The entire 3,423-pound piece shifts and is able to withstand winds upwards of 100 miles per hour. “Butterfly Rest Stop” even changes color and form based on the wind and the light.

The installation of “Butterfly Rest Stop” at Kaleidoscope Park recently took place earlier this summer. Final touches in the form of different lights to illuminate the sculpture at night are still to come. “It is gorgeous,” Kaleidoscope Park Executive Director Shawn Jackson says, calling the sculpture a “very photogenic piece.”

Jackson, who came to Kaleidoscope Park after serving as COO of The Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden, says it was a “natural partnership” to work with Echelman on “Butterfly Rest Stop.” “I think it’s just a great piece for Texas, really,” Jackson says.

Kaleidoscope Park is a city-owned park funded through a public-private partnership. Jackson explained that the park is looking at a soft launch opening in the late summer or early fall, followed by a grand opening the first weekend of October. “After October hits, after that weekend where we open everything and have the grand opening and the dedication of the park, (it) really will take life,” Jackson says of upcoming events and plans for Kaleidoscope Park.

That will include artistic events and performances at the park, including a performance by Plano Symphony Orchestra and local artist programs, among other engagements. “I would love to see some traveling art shows come through here,” Jackson says, pointing to her past experience working on Artscape at The Dallas Arboretum.

Right now, however, Frisco residents can already see beautiful art at the park from a distance thanks to “Butterfly Rest Stop.” Both Echelman and Jackson also describe how enjoyable it will be for parkgoers to sit down underneath the piece and look up at its changing form and colors. “The way I think about art is that it’s not complete without you, the viewer,” Echelman says, emphasizing the interconnectedness between her work, nature and the viewer that serves as the inspiration behind “Butterfly Rest Stop.”

For more information about Kaleidoscope Park, visit https://kaleidoscopepark.org/. For more information about Janet Echelman and her artistic work, visit  https://www.echelman.com/.

These interviews and this story have been edited for clarity.