The Pittsburgh Botanic Garden

Photo Credit: Pittsburgh Botanic Garden

I know this blog is predominantly concerned with garden history, but history has to start somewhere and it is always nice to report on contemporary projects that are going to have a long term legacy.

Photo Credit: Pittsburgh Botanic Garden

One such is the  Pittsburgh Botanic Garden, which founded in 1988 'is transforming 460 acres just 20 minutes outside the city into a world-class botanic garden, including 18 distinct gardens, five diverse woodland experiences, an enhanced visitor’s center, an amphitheater for outdoor concerts and performances, a celebration center to accommodate large outdoor or indoor weddings and corporate events, and a center for botanic research.' The vision of the garden is stated in the masterplan.

The Vision of the Future.  Photo Credit: Pittsburgh Botanic Garden

It should be noted that the botanic garden is NOT OPEN for general admission at this time but there are scheduled 'Peek and Preview' events and tours which can be booked via the Botanic Garden's website, where you can also find a full history of the story so far.

Giardini Botanici Villa Taranto devastated by freak strom

The Daily Telegraph reports that the famous botanic garden of Villa Taranto on the shores of Lake Maggiore was hit by freak, 70 miles per hour winds last weekend.  Not least of the damage is the loss of a third of the trees and shrubs.

Image from Villa Taranto

The botanic garden, which as a result of the damage is now closed indefinitely, was the work of a Scot, Captain Neil Boyd McEacharn (1884-1964.)  A passionate botanist who fell in love with Italy at the tender age of eight, McEacharn was the scion of a wealthy shipping family.  

In 1930 after a two years search to find the perfect spot where he could establish his garden and plant collection, McEacharn saw an advertisment in The Times purchased the La Crocetta estate and set about his transformation.

Interrupted by the second world war McEacharn (who in 1952 opened the gates to the public) continued to develop the garden until his death, and until last weekend the 40-acre botanic garden which is considered on of Europe's finest contained about 20,000 taxa of plants from around the world, from the Amazon to the Himalaya.

The California Botanic Garden of Mandeville Canyon

The California Botanic Garden in Brentwood's Mandeville Canyon. Courtesy of the Pacific Palisades Historical Society Clearwater Collection, Santa Monica Public Library.

A fascinating piece from KCET.org giving the history of what was planned to be Los Angeles's finest botanical gardens.  In 1928 the California Botanic Garden, the brain child of  businessman and naturalist H. C. Oakley, opened  in the hills of Brentwood.  The aim was to plant 800 acres of land in the Mandeville Canyon, part of the Santa Monica Mountains, and to create a huge botanic garden.  Sadly the Great Depression got in the way and the gardens closed in 1935.  A sad story but an interesting one nonetheless.

Aztec Gardens

Is a subject that I have only come to learn about recently - and to be amazed by.  For example, the garden at Huaxtepec (now Oaxtepec and south of Mexico City) created by Moctezuma I (r.1440-1469) was an exhibition of royal power-gardening, a site of religious significance, a cosmic paradigm and possibly representational of symbol of the paradisical afterlife garden of Tlalocan.  And if this were not enough, Moctezuma had planted the many different species he ordered sent from all over his empire.  The collection had a focus on medicinal plants, making Huaxtepec probably  the world's first botanic garden.

Sadly the garden is now under a holiday park but to read more about the subject in general, may I recommend this excellent article on Aztec Royal Pleasure Parks.