The Palm House
In
1841 when Sir William Jackson Hooker became Director of the Royal Botanic
Gardens, Kew, the gardens were increased in size from 8 to 26 hectares and
responsibility for them transferred to the Commissioners of Woods and Forests.
In line with this new status and the fact that the general public had recently
been granted access, it was felt that the gardens should have a prestigious
glasshouse tall enough to house palms.
Original construction
The Palm House was built between 1844 and 1848, the result of a complex collaboration between the Irish ironfounder Richard Turner and the architect Decimus Burton. The location was determined by Burton who was adamant that it should stand by an area of water then known as George III's lake so that the reflection of the house would be obtained in the water. The curator, John Smith, was against the idea as the land was very swampy. In keeping with the Victorian 'age of iron' the entire house structure was built of iron and curved glass was used, tinted green to act as shading. To replace Burton's idea for heavy cast iron arches, Turner proposed the use of a wrought iron 'deck beam' used in ship building to span greater widths of unsupported space. The house has, ever since, been compared to the upturned hull of a graceful liner. An Italianate campanile was built approximately 150 m south-east of the house to dispose of smoke from the furnaces located in the Palm House basement. The pipes leading to the tower were placed in a tunnel with a railway to bring fuel to the Palm House and to remove ashes. The artist and garden architect, William Andrews Nesfield, landscaped the grounds in the vicinity, making the Palm House the focal point of two long avenues - Pagoda Vista and Syon Vista.
Victorian planting
In September 1848, the Curator, John Smith, moved the first palms (Sabal mauritiiformis and two species of Phoenix) into the house with the help of engineers from Deptford Dockyard. Because the floor space was very much larger than any other available in Kew for palms, only the centre of the house could be filled and the wings were initially left empty. The house had never been intended solely for palms and in 1865 other tropical plants were planted amongst them. Benches along the sides, built originally for propagation but found to be too cold, held a variety of tropical species in pots.
Problems in the Palm House
To aid the circulation of heat through the house, floor grilles of perforated iron were laid over the underground hot water pipes meaning that everything had to be grown in pots and tubs.
Initially, most plants survived very well in the house and the growth was lush. However, heating problems plagued the first two decades of the operation of the house and as John Smith rightly predicted the basement boiler houses flooded. Fire engines were installed to pump out the water and later the floor was raised.
In 1961, the boiler houses were moved to an area behind the campanile known as the Shaft Yard and the boilers converted to oil. The campanile was used as a chimney and the tunnel served as a duct for the heating pipes.
The restorations
By the 1950s the house had survived more than a hundred years of external weathering as well as the high humidity and temperatures within. During the Second World War, it received little maintenance and began to deteriorate. It was closed to the public in 1952 after an engineering report recommended that 'a scheme be prepared for a complete replacement for the house'. A number of proposals for a completely new house design were considered and it is lucky that none was seriously taken up. The surveyors of the Ministry of Works had a high regard for the building and were anxious that it should be preserved in its original form. The building remained closed for seven years while the glazing bars were cleaned and realigned, the whole house re-glazed, new beds built and other sizable restorative measures taken. The house was never emptied of plants and the potted palms and other tropical plants were moved around inside the building to accommodate the works. The Palm House was re-opened by the Queen in June 1959.
All was fine until the early 1980s when several pieces of guttering fell through the glass to the floor. Eventually the structure became very unsafe and regular maintenance stopped as the operation became more dangerous and difficult. A comprehensive survey was carried out and major restorative work to the building and heating system deemed necessary. In 1984 the house was totally cleared of plants for the first time in its history. Many were moved to temporary accommodation in a purpose-built greenhouse but some were too large and had to be cut down and made into specimens for the herbarium and museum. The oldest pot plant in the world, Encephalartos altensteinii, was the most difficult plant to be transported and a special scaffold was constructed to support it in transit.
The restoration of the Palm House commenced in the autumn of 1985. Because of the advanced state of disrepair it was decided to dismantle virtually the whole building so that a good restoration job could be done. As the Palm House is a Grade I listed building and the most important surviving nineteenth-century glass and iron structure in the world it was necessary to replace like with like, so ductile iron was used for castings. Mild steel was used for strengthening the main arches and stainless steel for the ten miles of glazing bars. Toughened glass was used with a fungicide impregnated sealant. Many original parts of the building were re-instated in the refurbished house. The floor layout was revised to accommodate planting in beds rather than pots and tubs and provide wider paths and seats for the comfort of visitors. The basement areas, which originally housed the boilers, were enlarged to house staff facilities and a new marine display exhibiting a series of natural marine habitats that emphasise the importance of marine plants.
The restoration was finished in November 1988 - too late in the year to start moving plants from one heated greenhouse to another but the building was opened to the public for appreciation of the architecture and for a Christmas carol concert. On 4 April 1989 Encephalartos altensteinii was moved back and the replanting of the Palm House then began in earnest to be completed in the middle of August 1989. The Palm House was officially re-opened by HM The Queen Mother on 6 November 1990.
The Palm House plants today
The house has been planted as one habitat, tropical rainforest, and plants from the tropics are shown in three sections: African flora in the South Wing, plants from Asia, Australia and the Pacific in the North Wing and American flora in the centre transept. The two large beds in the centre transept hold the tallest tree palms of the tropics worldwide.
The plantings simulate the multi-layered nature of a tropical rainforest with canopy palms and other trees, climbers, epiphytes and then shorter understorey plants and dwarf palm species. The Palm House contains only rainforest species of cycads.
People use palm-based products in many ways. The collection reflects this by holding a great number of economically useful palms such as the African oil palm (Elaeis guineensis), coconut (Cocos nucifera) and various rattan palms that are used in the furniture industry.
There are also many well known tropical crop plants in the Palm House, including banana (Musa), breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis) and rubber (Hevea brasiliensis). Their arrangement within the overall design was carefully considered and planned so that educational labels and trails could follow logically around the house. Particular architectural specimens were used as focal points to catch the eye at the end of walkways.
Conservation
The Palm House aims to illustrate the diversity of palms and to maintain a stock of endangered species grown from wild collected seed from threatened areas such as logging sites. Indeed, the house contains a high proportion of plants that have become rare in their native habitats - several are even extinct.
