Royal Botanic Garden, Sydney


The Royal Botanic Garden, Sydney is a heritage-listed major botanical garden, event venue and public recreation area located at Farm Cove on the eastern fringe of the Sydney central business district, in the City of Sydney local government area of New South Wales, Australia.
Opened in 1816, the garden is the oldest scientific institution in Australia and one of the most important historic botanical institutions in the world. The overall structure and key elements were designed by Charles Moore and Joseph Maiden, and various other elements designed and built under the supervision of Allan Cunningham, Richard Cunningham, and Carrick Chambers. The garden is owned by the Government of New South Wales and administered by the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust. The Botanic Garden, together with the adjacent Domain were added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 2 April 1999.
The Garden and The Domain are open every day of the year and access is free. Its position on Sydney Harbour, the Sydney Opera House and the large public parklands of The Domain ensure it is one of the most visited attractions in Sydney. The garden is bordered by the Cahill Expressway to the south and west, Macquarie Street to the northwest, Art Gallery Road to the east, and Sydney Harbour to the north.

Establishment and development

The first farm by European settlers on the Australian continent, at Farm Cove, was established in 1788 by Governor Arthur Phillip. Although that farm failed, the land has been in constant cultivation since that time, as ways were found to make the relatively infertile soils more productive. The Botanic Garden was founded on this site by Governor Macquarie in 1816 as part of the Governor's Domain. Australia's long history of collection and study of plants began with the appointment of the first Colonial Botanist, Charles Fraser, in 1817. The Botanic Gardens is the oldest scientific institution in Australia and, from the earliest days, has played a major role in the acclimatisation of plants from other regions. After a succession of colonial botanists and superintendents, including the brothers Richard and Allan Cunningham, both also early explorers, John Carne Bidwill was appointed as the first Director in 1847. Charles Moore was possibly the most influential Director, with his responsibility spanning 48 years, from 1848 to 1896. Moore was succeeded by Joseph Maiden who added much to Moore's maturing landscape, and served for a period of 28 years.

The first one hundred years

Charles Fraser, Superintendent 1821–31, was the first botanist appointed to develop the gardens along scientific lines. Fraser made many inland excursions particularly with John Oxley and brought back plants and specimens. Fraser's plantings between 1827 and 1828 from his Brisbane district and northern NSW travels survive, and include hoop pines, weeping lilly pillies, a hoop pine, 2 swamp oaks on the eastern side of the palm grove. On his death in 1831 he was succeeded by Richard Cunningham. His brother, the explorer Allan Cunningham was also a director. A native red cedar Fraser collected in 1822 formerly thought to have been from the Parramatta region has been genetically tested and found to have been collected in the Dorrigo region. This tree grows still near the Palm House.
In 1825 Governor Brisbane directed that the Garden extend west of Farm Cove Creek, for an experimental garden, to acclimatise Australian plants for export and imported plants. Between 1829 and 1838 the wine growing industry of New South Wales began in the Garden with some vines being brought out with the First Fleet, and a large supplementary collection of around 365 vine cultivars donated by James Busby in 1832. Busby in fact imported cuttings of over 540 vines, but all those of at least 170 of the accessions were either dead on arrival at Sydney or did not survive through to mid-1834. For three or four years, vines propagated from these plants were distributed throughout the colony, but the collection increasingly fell into neglect and was in a parlous state well before 1840, with very many vines dead and many of the remainder unidentifiable due to the loss of their labels and inadequate record keeping. In the 1830s the Lower Garden area at the head of Farm Cove was developed and the shoreline laid out in an ornamental fashion with serpentine paths. In 1833 four gardens were recognised: the botanic garden ; the fruit garden; the experimental garden and the kitchen garden, still producing food for the Governor's table. Between 1837 and 1845 the Government House was built in The Domain's north. In 1847 the fig tree avenue of Moreton Bay figs was planted, lining main public entry to gardens from Macquarie Street eastward.
The East India Company windmill stood in The Domain near Government House stables. It was located close to the statue of a huntsman with dogs by Henri Alfred Jacquemart, which is still in the grounds of the Royal Botanical Garden. Built of stone, it was owned by the Government and was used for grinding the grain of the settlers. According to Freeman's Journal, the windmill was built by the East India Company who were granted land around Farm Cove. The Governor of New South Wales later took forcible possession of the mill which resulted in a drawn-out lawsuit between the company and the government. During the dispute the Collector of Internal Revenue, Mr Wm. McPherson hired a manager to live in the cottages next to the mill. At this time, where the Bent-street entrance now is, was occupied as a large dairy, kept by Mr W. Stone. There was a large gate near the dairy; it stood a bit in from Bent-street, and faced Macquarie-street, with two large Norfolk Island pines on either side. This was the entrance to the company's mill, but it could not be called a public entrance in the accepted meaning, it being on private property. Finally, in 1835 Sir Richard Bourke had the mill taken down and removed.
In 1848 John Carne Bidwill was appointed Director, by Governor Fitzroy. Meantime in England horticulturist Charles Moore was appointed Director by the English Government. Bidwell was succeeded the following year by Moore. Bidwill was offered the post of Commissioner of Lands, Wide Bay. Moore was a Scotsman who had trained in the Botanic Gardens of Trinity College, Dublin. Moore remained Director for 48 years and did much to develop the Botanic Gardens in their modern form. He boldly tackled the problems of poor soil, inadequate water and shortage of funds to develop much of the Gardens as we see them today. The Palm Grove at the heart of the Garden is a reminder of his skill and foresight, as is the reclaimed land behind the Farm Cove seawall which significantly expanded the area of the Garden. Moore renovated paths throughout the upper gardens, built new paths in lower garden and added were added to the lower gardens between 1848 and 1858. Between 1848 and 1879 Moore organised construction of the sea wall and reclamation of Farm Cove's tidal flats to expand the Lower Garden, the wall being built of stone recycled from demolished Old Government House in Bridge Street, and a long walk was established along Farm Cove. Ornamental ponds in the lower garden were laid out using Farm Cove creek, water supply for upper gardens was aided by water pipe installed from Macquarie Street.
Other work completed under Moore's extensive tenure included:
  • 1850svista pavilions added in gardens, one with a thatched roof;
  • 1852the Sydney-based herbarium collection started;
  • 1857a small portion of the Governor's kitchen garden was converted as part of the Botanic Garden;
  • 1860an aviary opened after public lobbying;
  • 1860the original grape vines were uprooted;
  • 1862the Palm grove was established near the Middle Garden, summer houses built in gardens. A zoo was added to aviary area. The zoo was Sydney's first and operated in the Gardens from 1862 until 1883, when most of it was transferred to Moore Park. During these years much of the remnant natural vegetation of the surrounding Domain was removed and planted as parkland. The Moreton Bay figs, one of the major elements of this planting, continue to dominate the landscape. In the same year there was considerable plantings of NSW/Queensland rainforest tree species, and palms;
  • 1863cottage built near Governor's Bathing house for Government House gardener;
  • The Domain gate lodge and gates built,, Victoria Lodge gate house and gates was built at east of Gardens near Mrs Macquarie's Point
  • Late 1860smain part of Governor's kitchen garden given up as an addition to the Upper Garden;
  • 1870Governor's private gates built ;
  • 1870sdemolished the convict barracks built in Cunningham's time, and old glasshouses in former Governor's kitchen garden to make open grassed areas of Upper Garden;
  • 1871 of the former Governor's kitchen garden was converted to Botanic Gardens, used as a nursery and propagating ground;
  • 1873main entry gates built, off Fig Tree Avenue ;
  • 1874Italianate style two-storey Superintendent/Director's residence ;
  • 1876Palm house glasshouse built in Middle Garden; and
  • 1878single storey herbarium and overseer's residence built.
The Garden Exhibition Palace was built on land between the Government House stables and Governor Bourke's statue, an area until then used for grazing. The Palace was built to a design by Government Architect James Barnet for the first Australian International Exhibition. It was the epitome of the High Victorian style, complemented by the surroundings new gardens. Its giant dome was in diameter surmounted by a lantern above the ground'. Under the dome was a statue of Queen Victoria; there were four corner towers, and a floor area of over, making it a major landmark in the city landscape. he International Exhibition held in the Palace attracted over one million visitors, displaying products of the arts and industry, museum collections from the library of the Linnean Society, and exhibition of specimen displays from the Museums Collection of the Technological, Industrial and Sanitary Museum of NSW,. Joseph Maiden moved and displayed the remnants of the exhibition fire to a pavilion in The Domain which became the official museum, incorporating a herbarium.
In 1880 a monkey house was built as part of the zoo. The same year, Tarpeian Way, including a stone stairway of 53 steps, was cut out of the rocky escarpment north of Bennelong Point, forming a south east boundary to the gardens. From The Sydney Morning Herald, 4 October 1880:
Scottish gardener Alexander Grant was born in 1845 at Cullen, Scotland and served an apprenticeship in the gardens of Cullen House in Banffshire. Before migrating to Australia in 1878 he followed his profession in several Scottish gardens, including the Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh. Grant arrived in the colony in 1878 and worked first at Yaralla, Concord for the Walkers for some considerable time, then at Rosemont, Woollahra for Alexander Campbell MLC, then for Mr Tooth at the Swifts, Darling Point, which he planned and laid out. There is no record of where Grant was living while working at Yaralla and Rosemont, though from 1881 he lived at Willow Cottage in Point Piper Road – west side, Paddington until he moved to quarters in the Botanic Garden, Sydney in 1882 for work there. It is likely that the positions at Yaralla and Rosemont both included quarters for a single man and that only after he married Margaret Stevenson in January 1880 was he obliged to find alternative accommodation.
Towards the end of his time as Director, Moore, together with Ernst Betche, published the Handbook of the Flora of New South Wales, further establishing the Botanic Garden as a centre for the science of botany.
From 1882 on Director Joseph Maiden added lighting, seating, lavatories, drinking fountains and pathways. In 1883 the zoo was relocated to Moore Park; and of Outer Domain were incorporated into the Lower Garden, completing the ring of waterfront along Farm Cove. During the 1880s the Tarpeian Rock was a prominent, dramatic and significant sandstone cliff landscape feature on the north west boundary of the Domain facing Bennelong Point and the Sydney Opera House, cut for the extension of Macquarie Street. The Rock derives its name from the famous Tarpeian Rock on the Capitoline Hill in Rome from where prisoners were hurled to their deaths in ancient times. A stairway gives access from close to the Sydney Opera House to the top of the rock and The Domain. An early carving in the sandstone cliff is located about above the fifth step from the base of the cliff. The carving reads "The Tarpeian Way." It possibly dates from the time of construction in the 1880s.
Between 1896 and 1901 Director Maiden installed new lighting, seating, lavatories, fountains and pathways. Lighting along the sea walk and the lower garden installed, making the ring of water front of the lower gardens complete. In 1897 the Governor Phillip fountain was built near Macquarie Street/Garden palace gates. In 1899 a new herbarium building was built; now the Anderson Building.