What is the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney?
The Royal Botanic Garden Sydney is a large harbourside garden beside the Sydney Opera House. Established in 1816, it is the oldest scientific institution in Australia.
The garden covers about 30 hectares on the shores of Farm Cove, where the first European farm in Australia was planted in 1788. Its lawns, glasshouses and collections of plants from around the world are free to visit every day.
Highlights include the Calyx, a glasshouse with changing plant displays, the rose garden, the succulent garden and the Cadi Jam Ora garden, which explains how the Gadigal people used local plants for food, medicine and tools.
Mrs Macquarie's Chair
On the headland at the edge of the Domain sits Mrs Macquarie's Chair, a bench carved into the sandstone by convicts in 1810 for Elizabeth Macquarie, wife of Governor Lachlan Macquarie. It offers one of the best views of the Opera House and Harbour Bridge.
The garden also manages the Australian Botanic Garden at Mount Annan and the Blue Mountains Botanic Garden at Mount Tomah, as well as the National Herbarium of New South Wales.
Did You Know?
The garden plays a key role in protecting the rare Wollemi pine, a tree known from fossils before living trees were found in 1994.