The Naples Botanical Garden maintains the region’s only conservation seed bank. It contains more than 1 million seeds from 168 species of native Florida and Caribbean plants threatened by rising sea levels, habitat loss and other stressors.
To draw attention to this “Hidden Wonder,” the garden has invited Miami-based ceramic sculptor and installation artist Lauren Shapiro to create an exhibition. “What Is Gathered Remains” opens Jan. 23 but guests can help create glass tiles for the exhibition at community workshops on Nov. 14 and 15.
“Any opportunity we have to make deeper connections with our collection through art, we're doing it,” said Curator of Art and Culture at Naples Botanical Garden Sten Kerwin. “We look at workshops as another opportunity to create deeper those connections, to create memories and meaning-making.”
Kerwin met Shapiro through the artist in residence in the Everglades Residency Program.
“I really appreciated her approach,” Kerwin said. “She takes a lot of time researching and studying before she starts to produce work, which I thought was really exciting and interesting.”
Shapiro’s work focuses on marine, terrestrial, and built ecosystems. She has immersed herself in Southwest Florida’s most at-risk habitats to understand and document how the garden conserves native plants through seed banking. She will incorporate that research into kiln-carved glass tiles adorned with ornamental designs representing the native plants she encountered.
Participants in the November workshops will cut and arrange predetermined motifs onto special kiln paper which Shapiro will fire in her studio in Miami’s historic Bakehouse Art Complex.
MORE INFORMATION:
“What is Gathered Remains” opens Jan. 23 and runs to June 1, 2027.
This new collection of site-specific works headlines the Naples Botanical Garden’s season and embodies its Hidden Wonders theme.
Hidden Wonders unveils the inner workings of ecosystems, obscure stories from the collections, and the behind-the-scenes work that goes into saving plants and cultivating a tropical oasis.
In addition to those inspired by the native plants included in the garden’s seed bank, Shapiro’s ceramic sculptures will also reflect another disappearing habitat: the Art Deco architecture that defines Miami Beach. Like Southwest Florida’s plants, these historic buildings are threatened by floods, storms, and human development.
The Nov. 14 and 15 workshops take place from 10 a.m. to noon.
About Lauren Shapiro
Shapiro blends ecology, architecture, and digital craft to build immersive public installations. Her sculptural forms range from vessels and reliefs to large-scale public art installations. Her practice draws from original fieldwork and site-specific studies, blending organic textures with geometric and architectural motifs. Through collaborations with scientists, and by combining digital tools with traditional hand-built methods, Shapiro creates works that reflect nature’s fragility and human history — serving as both artworks and archives. Her work experiments with art’s possibility to affect change and cultivate a broad awareness of our environment.
Select solo exhibitions include “Pastiche” (2024) at Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, Miami; “Garden Portals” (2021) at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, Miami; “Future Pacific” (2020) at Bakehouse Art Complex, Miami; and “Fragile Terrains” (2018) at Bianca Boekel Galeria, São Paulo, Brazil.
Select group exhibitions include "Intricate Oceans: Coral in Contemporary Art” (2023) at Coastal Discovery Museum, Hilton Head Island, South Carolina; “DesignMiami” (2021) with Todd Merrill Studio; “Powder Hounds” (2020) at the Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Aspen, Colorado; and “Projektraum M54” (2017) in Basel, Switzerland.
Shapiro received awards from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts (2019), Knight Foundation (2020), Awesome Foundation (2020), Oolite Arts (2020), Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs, and is currently artist in residence for a National Science Foundation grant awarded to marine ecologists at California State University, Northridge.
Her work is in the Soho House Art Collection and the Jorge M. Perez Collection, among others.
Shapiro received a master’s degree in Fine Arts from University of Miami in Ceramics (2016) and a BFA from Florida Atlantic University (2009).
Artist Statement
Writes Shapiro, “My practice investigates the relationships between nature, architecture and time through large-scale ceramic sculpture and site-specific installation. Drawing on coral reefs, ecological data, and botanical systems, I translate environmental research into tactile, immersive artworks — ranging from vessel-based forms to digitally modeled reliefs and monumental public commissions.
“Working at the intersection of traditional craftsmanship and emerging technologies, I blend hand-built ceramics with 3D scanning, CNC carving, and mold-making to evoke organic textures and sacred geometries found in natural systems. These hybrid forms act as contemporary reliquaries—preserving fragile ecological narratives and prompting reflection on human impact and environmental change.
“While grounded in solo studio practice, my work also invites collaboration: I often engage communities through participatory events and educational programming, allowing the public to imprint clay forms that become part of larger sculptural ecosystems. These moments of civic engagement extend the meaning of the work beyond object-making, creating space for shared stewardship, material memory, and ecological awareness.”
About the Naples Botanical Garden seed bank
The garden maintains Southwest Florida’s only conservation seed bank. The ever-growing collection represents rare and common native species as storms, climate change, sea-level rise, invasive pests, and urban sprawl threaten all plants. It includes species from the Caribbean because Southwest Florida shares a plant palette, growing conditions, soil types, and weather patterns with its island neighbors.
Garden conservationists conduct novel research into long-term preservation strategies, plant growth habits, and preferred conditions. The seed collection and the knowledge gleaned from it allows the garden to embark on restoration projects, amass native plants for use following natural disasters, and advise local governments on the trees and plants best suited for ecosystem health.
The seed bank includes:
- Over 1 million seeds, representing 166 species
- 158 species native to Florida
- 89 species native to the Caribbean
- 17 plants that grow only in our region
- 16 state-threatened species
- 13 state-endangered species
- 2 federally listed threatened species
Collecting seeds is only part of the equation. Garden conservationists must figure out how to store them for the long term and how to prompt them to grow. There is little existing research on Southwest Florida’s native plants; through experimentation and observation, the conservationists unlock the secrets of how to grow them.
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.
