Friendship Forest is situated in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Western North Carolina in the United States. It was established by a group of old friends that first met as students and instructors of psychology at Katholieke Hogeschool (now Tilburg University) in the Netherlands. Humorously calling themselves the Harde Kern (Hard Core), the members of the group have remained close friends for over 50 years.
Now in the year 2021, with two of their members having recently passed on, the group has chosen to create this small forest. In a beautiful woodland setting, a long-lived hardwood tree will be planted to honor the memory of each individual member of the Harde Kern and to celebrate the strength of the groups’s enduring friendship. Each species of tree (white oak, Dutch elm, hickory, etc.) is associated with a different member of the Harde Kern.
The trees, themselves, are identified with an RC Code at their base. Visitors to the forest can scan this code with their cell phone and thereby learn facts about the tree as well as information about the person whom it honors. They will see a photo of the individual, some basic facts about his or her life, as well as a favorite poem, quotation, or song of that person.
For those who live too far away to regularly visit, the information that is provided on-site will also be available on this website. And, in addition to this information, there will be one or more wildlife webcameras in the forest which will be live-streamed to this website. These cameras will provide, in real time, scenes from the Forest and will capture visits by deer, turkeys, wolves, fox, coyotes, bears and other animals that are native to the region.
A Living Forest
A tree’s roots grow deep in the soil. They divide and they extend further and further from the tree. So, too, do each of us grow in our own lives — marrying, raising families, working and touching many different people, in ways we are not even aware.
In a similar way, the Friendship Forest will continue to grow. New trees will continue to be planted long after all of the original Harde Kern have passed on. Any relative or friend of a person who has a tree in the forest may have a tree planted there himself. That person need only describe how the other person came to influence them in their own life.
The forest will thus come to symbolize the transcendent nature of life, the passage from one person to another, and of all it means to be human.