From Begonias – one of our key research areas – to towering tree ferns, the completed Palm Houses will be home to around 600 botanical specimens. But one has particular significance.
Standing around 2.4 metres tall, a young Sabal mexicana now grows beneath the 22-metre dome of the rectangular Palm House. No ordinary plant, it is the 10-year-old offspring of the famed sabal palm that graced the octagonal house for 200 years. One of the oldest plants in the Garden, the parent was brought to Inverleith from our previous site at Leith Walk in the 1820s. Too large and too frail to move when restoration work began, it was felled in 2021.
While the original palm’s growth was constrained by the 15.2 metre dome of the former Tropical Palm House, this young progeny has far more space to grow safely in its new home for decades or even centuries to come.
The young sabal is a living link to our past – but another ‘planting’ reaches far into the future.
To mark the restoration, a time capsule has been buried within the palm houses. The silver container holds the names and photographs of 29 members of the Glasshouse Horticulture team who cared for, removed and returned the Collection during the project. Alongside these are an engraved Sabal mexicana label, that day’s weather observations, the front page of The Scotsman, a map of the Garden and a Botanics’ shop receipt as a snapshot of everyday life and cost.
Now registered with The International Time Capsule Society, the capsule will be opened by future RBGE colleagues in 2070, marking the 400th anniversary of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.
Images show Glasshouse Horticulturists Marc Gilbert, Neil Watherston and Kevin Bannon with the time capsule and young Sabal mexicana.
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