Natural History Museum: Evolution Garden

“No story is more dramatic than the story of our planet” declares the first plaque that greets you upon exiting the South Kensington Underground station. Standing in a tunnel of towering slabs of rock and seeing the intricate façade of the Natural History Museum at the end, you have to agree with this statement. Stunning blocks of Lewisian gneiss, Torridonian sandstone, greenschist from Argyll and Bute, and other iconic UK rock samples lead you into the Evolution Garden. 

The transformation of five acres of land around the Museum began in 2022, resulting in the new Nature Discovery Garden, Nature Activity Centre, and Evolution Garden. Developing these outdoor spaces is part of the Museum’s larger Urban Nature Project, which aims to safeguard nature in towns and cities across the UK. 

Throughout the Garden, visitors can hop between different geological time periods and learn about what state our Earth’s oceans, land, and atmosphere were in and how life developed in response. Information signs on different time periods are accompanied by a variety of rock samples, plants, pictures, and relief models of creatures. The latter are very effective at bringing these creatures to life; rather than seeing a flat trace fossil or imprint of a trilobite or ammonite in a rock, visitors can feel the shape of the creatures and visualise them in 3D. 

The star of the geological journey is undoubtedly Fern, a bronze cast of the Museum’s famous Dippy the diplodocus, whose head towers over visitors walking past. Through Fern, we learn about the factors that can lead to mass extinction events, from volcanic eruptions to global temperature change. However, this is not the end of the journey, as we see how life bounced back from extinction, with trees surviving to the present day in fossilised form and London itself having evidence of tropical conditions roughly 50 million years ago. 

Free to enter and open daily, the Evolution Garden is an excellent opportunity for communicating to a wide range of people how the Earth and life have evolved over time. Back at the entrance to the Evolution Garden, a plaque proposes “By understanding these changes in the past, we can plan for a future where planet and people thrive”. Whilst this statement is undoubtedly important and represents the fundamental geological principle of uniformitarianism, the increasingly varied role of geoscientists in this future could be emphasised further. While studying the rocks and fossils featured in the Garden will continue to be important, other aspects of geoscience, such as renewable energy, sustainable mining, and natural hazard management, could be highlighted in the Garden to communicate the relevance and diversity of geology as humans themselves must evolve to adapt to climate change. 

Reviewed by Marissa Lo 

Details:

The Evolution Garden at the Natural History Museum, London, is open daily 10.00-17.50 (except 24-26 December). For more details: www.nhm.ac.uk

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