← All articles · United Kingdom · 13 July 2012

Eden Project, United Kingdom: A rainforest indoors and a giant made of old appliances

The Eden Project in July 2012: bubble-wrap biomes in an old Cornish clay pit, a rainforest indoors, strange waxy flowers and a giant made of scrap.

In July 2012 we pointed the car at Cornwall for the Eden Project, the garden built inside a worked-out clay pit, with greenhouses shaped like colossal soap bubbles.

The hexagon-panelled biome domes of the Eden Project nestled in a green former clay pit with gardens and paths between them — The biomes from the rim of the pit: half greenhouse, half moon base.

Giant humanoid sculpture assembled from discarded appliances, satellite dishes and machine parts towering over greenery at the Eden Project — A giant built from thrown-away appliances, complete with satellite-dish eyes. He is watching your recycling habits.

Inga standing on the wooden steps of a bamboo hut with a corrugated roof inside the rainforest biome, hexagonal roof panels visible beyond the treetops — Deep in the rainforest biome, where a bamboo hut and a parked bicycle sell the illusion right up until you spot the hexagons overhead.

A waxy green cone-shaped flower head growing among tall bamboo-like stems — A waxy green cone that looks factory-made. It isn't.

Inga leaning in close with her camera to photograph glossy green leaves — One of us photographing the plants; the other photographing the photographer.

Give it a full day and comfortable shoes: what goes down into the pit must climb back out. We surfaced the next day in Torquay.

The planting inside the biomes deserved a closer look, and it got one in the Eden Project gallery.