Luying Deng missed seeing the cherry blossoms on Easter Sunday. So, she made it a point on Monday to head to Jackson Park before it’s too late.
She was not disappointed. She saw delicate pink and white flower petals.
“We’re lucky! It’s blooming,” said Deng, of Chicago.
Blooming has begun for some of the 230 cherry trees surrounding the Columbia Basin south of the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry.
The robust bloom, expected to unfold over the next five to 10 days, has been fueled by fluctuations in weather and temperature, combined with an ample amount of rainfall, according to the Chicago Park District.
But they may not stay like that for long.
Onlookers enjoy a seasonally early cherry blossom bloom outside the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry on the South Side, Monday, April 6, 2026.
Candace Dane Chambers/Sun-Times
“Nature's ephemeral, and everything is contingent on how the winter went," said Michael Dimitroff, director of public art for the Chicago Park District. "Nature is the dictator. We, as practitioners, try to read what's happening. If we have a super hard winter and a mild rollout of warm weather, then it's a little easier to read that they're going to come out when weather starts to break and stays constant."
That time is now.
Predicted Monday night lows below 30 degrees were not expected to affect blooming, Dimitroff said, since it is expected to warm up this week.
“This year, fortunately, it looks like we have a pretty good bloom," Dimitroff said. "We didn't get any radical weather. We had a few ups and downs. You know, [Tuesday] is going to be 28 or 29 [degrees] so that going to slow things down a bit. But if it's just one day, I think we'll be OK."
Jackson Park hasn't always been home to five species of cherry trees.
In 2013, the first batch of 120 trees was planted to commemorate the 120th anniversary of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition.
Cherry blossom trees bloom early outside the Griffin
