London glasshouse of rare plants to reopen
A GLEAMING monument to the ambition and creativity of its age, the world’s largest Victorian glasshouse will once again welcome visitors to see some of the world’s rarest plants following a lengthy facelift.
Temperate House in London’s Kew Gardens is large enough to house three jumbo jets, and was home to about 1 000 species of plants from around the world before it was shut in 2013 after falling into a state of disrepair.
“There was rust everywhere, all the paint was falling off, and look now, it’s all brand spanking new,” project manager Andrew Williams said, as a fleet of diggers and teams of workers put the finishing touches to the £41-million (R668-million) renovation project.
The wrought iron and glass structure was designed by esteemed Victorian architect Decimus Burton in 1860 and opened in 1863.
The facelift required the removal of 69 000 individual elements to be cleaned, repaired or replaced and the restoration of 15 000 panes of glass.
Enough paint to cover four football pitches was used to spruce up the huge iron columns, and Kew expects hundreds of thousands of visitors to pass through its doors annually after its May reopening.
“Everybody who has worked in here is really proud and now you see the plants going in, it’s a fantastic space.”
With weeks to go before the grand reopening, horticulturalists are hard at work rehousing the plants.
“It’s going to take us about nine months to get all the plants back in,” Temperate House supervisor Scott Taylor said. – AFP