New Zealand ecological gardens, Isle of Man (UK)

This competition was to develop ideas for the establishment and conservation of representative plant ecologies found across New Zealand. This botanical gardens - ecological gardens development at a private estate on the Isle of Man is to showcase the botany and ecology of island biomes across the temperate world including Chile, Tasmania, and Japan as well as New Zealand. The climate of the Isle of Man is similar to parts of New Zealand and so the range of NZ vegetation it would be possible to establish is surprisingly wide.

The concept behind our entry was that of a journey from lowland forest at the bottom of the site to hill and mountain vegetation at the top. Much attention was paid to various linked water bodies and wetlands.

The southern section represents mixed podocarp-broadleaf forest with glades and gaps, the central sections both Chatham Island ecosystems and wetland water purification, and the northern sections complete the journey through forest/tussock edge and scrub to a mountain ecocline. The more formal gardens behind the old converted church would house a collection of rare cultivars of New Zealand species.