Virtual Visit: A Garden on Mars

As we’re all stuck at home for the moment, I thought it would be nice to take some virtual tours of lovely places. For today’s visit, we’re doing something a little bit different and taking a trip in our time machine. We’re going back to May 2007, when garden designer Sarah Eberle won a gold medal at RHS Chelsea for “600 Days with Bradstone”.

The garden, which also won Best in Show, was named after the hypothetical 600 days of an astronaut’s first mission to Mars. The idea was to realistically model what might be used in a future human habitation on Mars. The designer started thinking about a possible space garden in the late 1990s and liaised with ESA experts to learn about the scientific and environmental factors affecting a mission to Mars.

“We had to make many assumptions, but everything in the garden is based on real science.”

The garden was designed to be partially dug into the planet surface and to grow within a domed habitat, protected from the Martian environment. Its purpose is to provide astronauts with food and medicinal herbs, contribute clean air and water to the life support systems, and be a morale-boosting place to hang out when off duty. All the benefits of a garden of Earthly delights, on Mars.

“You have to consider colour, water and plant longevity. Also, how would someone feel for 600 days in space? I thought the feeling of seeing something growing would be most important.”

The garden features red stones specially selected and quarried in Scotland for their similarity to the colours and textures of Martian rock. Paving throughout the garden echoes the scorched clay polygons of Alaska’s permafrost, which closely resemble patterns seen on Mars.  A wind turbine harvests energy from the 70mph winds.

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