The Merwin Conservancy

Few writers in the American literary canon are identified as closely to a place as W.S. Merwin is with his palm forest on Maui. Reminiscent of Henry David Thoreau at Walden Pond, the life and work of Merwin, whom The Washington Post called “the greatest living poet of his time”, is indelibly tied to this land. The Merwin Conservancy is a nonprofit arts and conservation organization located on the island of Maui, Hawaii, with the mission to inspire innovation in the arts and sciences by advancing the ideas of W.S. Merwin – his life, work, house and palm forest – as fearless and graceful examples of the power of imagination and renewal.

To fulfill this mission, the Conservancy maintains the house and palm forest as a place of stillness and reflection for retreat, study, and contemplation through a residency program for creative visionaries and thought leaders from Hawaii and across the world. We engage both local and global communities through our Green Room literary and environmental salon series, through dynamic multimedia storytelling projects, and through innovative collaborations with various artistic, scientific, and educational leaders and institutions.