With every visit, the Gardening exhibition’s fresco is enriched by each visitor’s contribution, transforming over time into a wild garden, full of promise and possibilities.
In their own garden, each gardener creates a space that reflects their unique vision of nature, shaped by their own sensibilities and needs. In the fresco experience, everyone can sow a plant using seeds bombs inscribed with evocative words, choosing a plant that fits their vision, or simply one whose name they like. What have you planted?
The Big-hearted
Generosity is a way of being in the world. This category honours plants that feed humans, pollinators and other animals, and others that offer refuge to biodiversity. The exhibition’s fresco invites visitors to discover:
Rhubarb
Rheum rhaponticum
A gentle giant that is easy to grow and produces bountiful harvests for 20 years or more.
Apple Tree
Malus pumila
The fruit of this relatively fast-growing tree is the second-most consumed by humans worldwide, after bananas.
Honeysuckle
Lonicera xylosteum
Fragrant and colourful, this plant is a friend to insects and a feast for birds.
The Exuberant
Bright colours, generous proportions, and a sense of movement remind us that life in the garden expresses itself freely. Blossoming on the Gardening exhibition’s fresco are:
Dahlia
Dahlia pinnata
Cultivated since Aztec times, this flower puts on a late-season display of colour and form, thanks to numerous hybrid varieties.
Prickly Pear
Opuntia ficus-indica
With its striking form, this drought-resistant champion is also highly invasive! Its large fruits can contain up to 300 seeds.
Passion Flower
Passiflora caerulea
A climbing plant with large, intricate flowers, both beautiful and beneficial for its many therapeutic properties.
The Cosmopolitan
Though rooted in place, plants are great travellers. While humans have intentionally taken some species to the four corners of the globe, others wander around in secret, using clever dispersal strategies. Discover the stories of the fresco’s cosmopolitans:
Poppy
Papaver rhoeas
A “messicole” species – one that grows spontaneously in cereal fields – the poppy has accompanied the expansion of agriculture since the Neolithic era.
Strawberry Plant
Fragaria ananassa
A delicious plant, the strawberry uses more than one strategy to spread – by pollination and vegetative reproduction.
Fig Tree
Ficus carica L.
Native to dry environments, the fig has established itself in other regions in response to climate change.
The Secretive
Plants still hold many mysteries and every day we discover a little more about these silent and fascinating beings. What are the secrets of the fresco’s secretive plants?
Echinacea
Echinacea purpurea
This colourful plant plays a key role in herbal medicine and has been studied for its health benefits.
Creeping Thistle
Cirsium arvense
Creeping Thistle is a bioindicator plant. Although its appearance may seem innocuous, its presence signals high levels of organic matter, nitrogen fertilisers, and very compact soil.
Fern
Filicophyta
Present on Earth for more than 300 million years, ferns play an unexpected role in the ecosystem. They build humus, provide shelter for many invertebrates, and live in symbiosis with nitrogen-fixing bacteria that enrich the soil.
The Accommodating
Sociability thrives on exchange, connection, and shared presence. This category honours companion plants and symbiotic partnerships:
Hazel Tree
Corylus avellana L.
The roots of this shrub live in symbiosis with fungi, particularly truffles.
Ivy
Hedera helix L. Ivy is often accused of suffocating trees, yet quite the opposite is true! It protects them from temperature variations and happily provides shelter for other living organisms.
Basil
Ocimum basilicum
A great companion in any vegetable garden, basil is unassuming, low-maintenance, and naturally repellent to insects