The Eden Project
The Eden Project in Cornwall is one of the most ambitious and successful environmental visitor attractions in the world, an extraordinary garden and educational destination built within the enormous pit left by a former china clay quarry near St Austell. Opened in 2001, the project was created by entrepreneur Tim Smit and a team of designers, horticulturalists and engineers to tell the story of the relationship between plants and people and to make the case for environmental sustainability through direct experience rather than abstract argument. The most immediately striking features of the site are the two great Biomes: transparent geodesic dome structures covering approximately 3.9 hectares that create enclosed climate-controlled environments for plant communities from different world regions. The Rainforest Biome, the largest greenhouse in the world, maintains the temperature and humidity of a tropical rainforest and contains a towering collection of trees, climbers, epiphytes and understory plants from the rainforest regions of West Africa, Malaysia and South America. Visitors walk through this space on paths that pass beneath the forest canopy and provide close-up views of the extraordinary diversity of tropical plant life. The Mediterranean Biome replicates the warm, seasonally dry climate found around the Mediterranean basin, in California, South Africa and southern Australia, supporting a collection that includes ancient olive trees, citrus groves, proteas, succulents and the characteristic fragrant shrubs of the Mediterranean garrigue. The contrast between the two environments and the ways in which different plant communities have evolved to manage heat, cold, drought and flooding provides a concentrated lesson in the diversity of plant adaptation strategies. Beyond the Biomes, the outdoor gardens fill the quarry floor with plants and cultivated landscapes representing different farming systems, pollinator gardens, temperate and UK native habitats. Art installations, educational displays and seasonal events make the site rewarding throughout the year and in different weather conditions. The quarry setting itself is part of the appeal: the white clay cliffs surrounding the garden are visible throughout, reminding visitors that this extraordinary place was created on land that had been industrially exhausted and apparently written off as a wasteland.