Marie Selby Botanical Gardens houses a world-class collections of plants, but last year’s hurricanes, Helene and Milton, threatened its future. Phase 2 of the garden’s masterplan was set up with their protection a priority.
On Aug. 7, Sarasota Planning Board approved Phase 2 of Selby’s three-part masterplan. It was the final okay that the garden needed to move ahead with building its new conservatory and learning pavilion.
For Selby’s botanical horticulture vice president Angel Lara, the new conservatory can’t come soon enough. It’s a necessary step for propelling research and protecting Selby’s collections, he said.
The garden sustained substantial damage during the 2024 hurricane season. Helene carried powerful winds that broke “everything,” Lara said. Milton, following just two weeks later, brought a storm surge that infiltrated the current greenhouses with five feet of saltwater.
Trees on site suffered. Plants died. Weeks worth of repair had to be done within days. It was exhausting for the staff − not just the physical labor of clearing debris, but experiencing the loss of life, Lara said.
“It was like a one-two punch for us,” Lara said. “Once we got over that, we thought, ‘Thank God for this Phase 2,’ because I don’t think we could take another hit like that and get away with it.”
What to expect from the new conservatory
Selby’s current greenhouses were built in 1975, and 50 years ago, they were incredible. But now they have poor circulation and poor operating systems compared to recent innovations within the industry, Lara said.
The extent of Selby’s research is somewhat limited.
That’s changing. The new conservatory will introduce five rooms with varying plant biomes. Visitors will be able to view plants in a warmer, dryer semiarid house; a warm, wet tropical rainforest house; an exhibition space to continue Selby’s ongoing exhibit programming; a cloud forest montane house; and a jewel house, which showcases miniature, or rare, plants.
Vice president of botany Bruce Holst called Phase 2 “critical.” Holst and the botany team travel to Central and South America to preserve plants in the wild and conserve them in order to avoid a species extinction.
He worked closely with Lara and the rest of the design team to create the flow of the visitor experience. He wanted to create a movement that took guests from a low rainfall, tropical environment to a high rainfall, montane environment, he said.
“The montane environment is not something we have not been able to replicate here because of our very warm summers,” Holst said. “Having the cool montane house will be just revolutionary.”
His team hasn’t been able to bring back plants growing in cool environments, but soon, they’ll be able to grow hundreds more species.
Phase 2 also creates two more greenhouses for back-of-house research. Selby visitors will also have access to seven new specialty gardens including a fern garden, an orchid garden, an Asian garden, a Bromeliad garden and a cycad garden.
The new conservatory will also have “state-of-the-art greenhouse technology and building systems” that will allow the horticulture teams to control climates according to what the plants need.
Horticulture VP Lara worked closely with the building’s design team to create a building that could be a scientific powerhouse, while also withstanding a 500-year storm, he said.
Currently, the greenhouses, which do not have hurricane-resilient glass, are moving to a higher elevation within Selby’s campus, which Lara hopes will help mitigate flooding. Selby is also installing hurricane-proof glass for the conservatory’s walls and a polycarbonate roof, which has a glazing that dims light coming in, but also promotes resiliency.
All operating systems are on the roof to reduce flood damage, and Selby has back-up generators and RO systems, in the case it loses power.
“This is how we’re taking all this innovation and putting out the best product for our needs, which is basically sustainability,” Lara said. “We need a safe and secure place for these research collections.”
Selby has 20,000 plants in its living collection, many of which have been collected in the natural environment and brought back.
Ella Thompson covers real estate and development for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. Contact her at ethompson@gannett.com.
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