The Cambridge University Botanic Garden is undertaking a major project to revitalise their historic Systematic Beds (also known as order or family beds). PlantNetwork is supporting them by undertaking a benchmarking exercise to build a picture of how order beds are used and valued across Ireland and the UK, and you are invited to contribute by completing an on-line survey. Multiple responses from the same institution are encouraged – any divergence in viewpoints will be illuminating (and also remain anonymous) – and your survey answers will be very valuable even if your institution does not have (or no longer has) order beds. So make a hot drink and take ten minutes out to complete the Benchmarking Order Beds survey here.
The unique Systematic Beds at the Cambridge University Botanic Garden were designed in 1845 by Andrew Murray, the Garden’s first Curator, who set out to translate the most comprehensive botany book of the time into a beautiful planting design that could be used for teaching plant taxonomy—the science of identifying and classifying plants. However, this extraordinary three-acre planting of immensely rich heritage value has, since inception, remained almost totally uninterpreted, leaving the public outreach value untapped and unrealised. Yet from global issues of food security to the need to access high-quality green space in our increasingly high-density cities, the need for public understanding and enjoyment of plant diversity has never been greater.
The three year project, known as Understanding Plant Diversity, has been generously funded by The Monument Trust. The project’s ambition is to provoke curiosity about, and enjoyment of, the phenomenal flowering plant diversity represented on the Systematic Beds and to unlock their potential for research, learning and enjoyment among the Garden’s 275,000+ annual visitors. This will be delivered through a two-pronged programme: firstly, a horticultural renovation plan is being implemented which will both update and reinforce the contemporary scientific relevance of the Beds while conserving and enhancing their heritage significance – a delicate a balancing act; secondly a new interpretive structure and viewing point, the Rising Path, is being developed by Cambridge-based studio Chadwick Dryer Clarke, from which visitors can ‘walk back wisely’ to explore the Systematic Beds. Subject to planning approval, the Botanic Garden anticipates construction of the Rising Path will begin in early 2018. It is hoped the new facility will be ready for visitors in the summer of 2018, with the horticultural renovation of the Beds complete by the summer of 2019.
Juliet Day, Project Manager of Understanding Plant Diversity at the Garden and also a PlantNetwork Trustee , said: ‘My huge thanks in advance to all the PlantNetwork members for completing the Benchmarking Order Beds survey which will help us to put together a uniquely valuable insight into how plant taxonomy is presented for public engagement and science in our gardens today.’
You can follow the project’s progress: Instagram cubgsystematics and Twitter @cubgsystematics.