By Andy Winfield
This year marks the twentieth year the University of Bristol Botanic Garden has been at The Holmes. I started working for the Botanic Garden twenty-four years ago when it was on the edge of Leigh Woods; I had no idea I’d be at the Botanic Garden for as long as I have, or that I was signing up to huge moving operation, none of us did. I could spend a long time describing how we moved the Garden from one place to another, the hours and hours of digging, creating, and planting; but in a moment where we can stop and ponder the passage of time, I think the main thing we’re all most proud of is what the Garden has become.
There aren’t many jobs where people stop you and say thank you; there are lots of jobs that should, but we’re lucky enough to be in one where people do. People thank us for how the Garden makes them feel; this is something we forget when we have weed eyes engaged and just see bindweed everywhere. Sometimes people say it with real meaning, and other times they say it in passing; what these people don’t know until I tell them, is that as recently as fifteen years ago, most of what they were walking around was ‘works in progress’, piles of earth, stones, plants in bags, lines marked on the ground to indicate where the paths were going to go. The Garden today feels established and all grown up in more ways than just the size of the plants.
The aim of the Garden was multilayered; to be a resource for the University, for teaching and research; and this is what we’ve become. There are many Schools, departments, and student groups who use the Garden; it’s amazing how much the world of plants infiltrates into so many areas. From Science to Philosophy, Medicine to Innovation, the Garden has been there to support Education in the University. Student societies use the Garden for treasure hunts or socials; and individuals tell us at the end of term it’s been a valuable place for them to draw breath in times of stress. When students arrive in September, we pot up 1,500 Aloe veras with them in an event which has become an integral part of the University’s Welcome Week; afterwards we see these plants growing in student windows before being packed up in overstuffed cars at the end of the year. We’re proud that the Garden has fulfilled its brief as a versatile asset for the University.
As a public facing part of the University, we also wanted to look further into the city to become a resource that Bristol can be proud of. We’ve helped community groups with tools and plants; we’ve been heavily involved in the conservation of rare and threatened plants in the Avon Gorge working with Bristol conservation groups. We’ve worked with Bristol institutions such as the Arnolfini on the Seeds of Change project, artists such as Luke Jerram on Tipping Point, and The Impossible Garden. We had a Shaun the Sheep in 2015, the same year that Monty Don visited the Garden; Merlin Sheldrake gave a wonderful lunchtime talk in 2023; David Bellamy charmed everyone in 2008; James Wong gave a lecture in 2013, and Alice Roberts filmed here in 2011. In 2022 the Green Planet aired on BBC, and we were involved as a location for filming, as well as growing and supplying plants. We’ve put on a host of events such as the regular Bee and Pollination, Easter Sculpture, and Jazz, as well as ‘one off’ events such as orchestra, theatre, apple days, daffodil day, dance, Darwin themed events, choirs, science picnics, storytelling, to name just some.
With all this behind us, when we walk around the Garden, one of the things we as a team get most pleasure from are the comments from visitors, whether they’re a Botanist or someone who has been dragged there by a friend, there’s always something that will grab their attention; seeing the dragonflies emerge, the host of insect diversity, the birds, the butterflies. During the last twenty years we’ve evolved the garden with a very purposeful ‘rough around the edges’ feel to it, trying to work with nature rather than against it, encouraging wildlife to share the space with visitors. This is one of the ways that the Garden has developed such a peaceful air, where people are able to completely immerse themselves.
So, the Garden has many layers, built by the hands of staff and many, many brilliant volunteers and with the support of The Friends of the Botanic Garden; one of the oldest Botanic Garden Friends Groups in the country, in one of the youngest Botanic Gardens. The Friends are fifty years old this year as well, it’s a double anniversary; and we’ll tell you all about the Friends magnificent contribution to the Garden in another blog later in the year.