Christchurch Botanic Gardens Visitor Centre: Know Why Christchurch is Called the Garden City
The Christchurch Botanic Gardens are one of the most famous place in Christchurch. I couldn’t visit the city without paying a visit to the Botanic Gardens, also the visitor centre.
There was a lot of information in the visitor centre about how to raise plants. There were pictures with captions and explanations underneath. So all the visitors could easily understand what they were talking about.
Christchurch was called the garden city and plants had always been very important to the people of Christchurch.
There was a welcome board at the front, welcoming all visitors to the centre. It also had a poem in the local language printed on it.
There was another board thanking all the sponsors and supporters as well as the exhibition developers. Without them, there wouldn’t be a visitor centre at all.
One of the most interesting things I saw inside the exhibition was a large bronze statue of a crane.
The board next to the statue said that it had been made by Japanese craftsmen in the mid nineteenth century and donated to the garden in 1968.
Most of New Zealand weren’t big cities. New Zealand was full of forest land and agricultural land where people grew cereals and crops. It was also pastoral land where cattle and sheep were raised.
I learned about how agriculture evolved in New Zealand. The ancient Maoris would cut the trees and plants that were already growing. But the British settlers started to grow their own plants.
There was a chest from those old times. It was the kind of chest that the settlers would use to carry plants over the ocean.
Even the art gallery in Christchurch had a lot of paintings that were inspired by nature.
I could use the touch screen to watch recordings of visitors who had come to the Botanic Garden.
The people of Christchurch had put in a lot of effort to beautify the city. There were a lot of parks, gardens and flower shows in Christchurch.
This included Hagley Park, which was one of the oldest parks in New Zealand. The park had been used to graze cattle, for sports and also for military parades.
The exhibition highlighted some of the best features of the Botanic Gardens. This was the Peacock Fountain, Rose Garden and Cunningham House. Cunningham House had a lot of glass conservatories that were filled with exotic flowers. This was very popular in the nineteenth century.
There was a donation box in one room for visitors to contribute money. The board had a lot of interesting information about the garden. It told me how the first oak tree had been planted there 150 years ago and how the climate in that area was perfect for deciduous trees and evergreen trees from all over the world.
I really liked the way that they had decorated one area with dried maple leaves hanging from the ceiling. There were old black and white photographs and postcards stuck on the walls. There were even copies of old letters about the Botanic Gardens.
I saw that at first the gardens had been used to grow food. But by the 1990s, the gardens had become a place for relaxation.
In the 1950s, after the two world wars were over, soldiers started to return home and plant gardens. Growing vegetables was something men used to do. There were also little models of the kinds of houses and gardens that people had in those times.
In the 1890s, people were building big houses with huge gardens. In those days, gardens were something that rich people could enjoy. They built a lot of fountains and other water features.
In the 1850s, Englishwomen would plant flower gardens as a hobby. Women couldn’t do a lot of work in those days but gardening was considered a nice hobby.
I enjoyed learning about the history of gardens and gardening in New Zealand. The photographs also helped me understand everything better.
The little models were so cute that I decided to take pictures of them from up close.
Some of them even had little models of humans, along with the houses and trees.
One of the models even had little chairs and steps.
One end of the exhibition had a lot of gardening tools, like spades and trowels.
All the tools had been donated by the previous president of the Canterbury Horticultural Society.
Some of the spades and tools were quite old and I could see they were rusted.
There was even a rain coat that was once used by the old native people of the area.
There were decorative items and baskets made by weaving plants.
There was a fun board that showed why certain plants looked a certain way. Some plants stood up straight and some were bent over.
I also found out how the landscape of the Canterbury area had changed over the years. Sadly, human activity has wiped out many forests and trees.
A map showed me the kind of plants that were found in the garden and whether they were native plants or not.
I looked at the pictures of houses and items that were made from woven plants.
The weaving was done with something called harakeke fibre. It was used to make rope.
Another plant called totara was used to make wooden bowls.
As you can see in the image above, harakeke was also used to make men’s belts.
The native people also made pouches to store things with natural materials.
An entire board at the museum was dedicated to chocolate. Since everyone loves chocolate so much, it was interesting to learn about how chocolate is grown and cultivated.
People could join a program called Friends of the Christchurch Botanic Garden.
Plants have many great uses. I read about the importance of saving rare plants.
I also read about how it’s important to stop pollution in order to save plants.
One end of the centre had a shop where visitors could buy books and stuffed toys.
There were stuffed toys of broccoli, mushrooms and carrots. I really liked them.
