Fun places to explore

The Ian Potter Foundation Children’s Garden is full of interesting and interactive places to play and explore, including:

The Ruin Garden
This is a world of lush rainforest vegetation crawling and creeping over an old rock grotto.  Children can get up close and experience the giant leaves of Gunnera, the aerial roots of the walking fig and crawl around the ancient Redgum.  Children are able to scramble over and under rock, dig in the sand mulch and construct cubbies from collected plant materials.

Meeting Place
The Meeting Place is for visitors to gather on arrival.  A spiral water feature provides an exciting water play area on warm days.  Five Queensland Bottle Trees are a feature of this space, with their bottle shaped trunks highlighting some of the amazing ways plants have adapted to survive in their environment.

The Wetland Area
A natural pond teeming with life and a place where children can experience insects and plants.  Situated at the foot of the Discovery Shelter, children can use tools such as nets, aquaspheres, microscopes and a library to take their learning further.  The Discovery Shelter is also available for use as an undercover investigation space in wet weather.

The Bamboo Forest
A magical place where the entire space is defined by bamboo.  When in the bamboo forest the qualities of light, sound and texture all change.

The Gorge
Stepping stones lead visitors from the Meeting Place into the Gorge where children will be surrounded by large basalt shards.  Twisted and contorted Snow Gums grow between the shards providing a stark contrast in form.  Mist periodically fills the space creating an atmosphere of mystery.

Plant Tunnel
Along the northern and southern boundary of The Ian Potter Foundation Children’s Garden are two distinctly different plant tunnels. The northern boundary tunnel is mostly composed of Coastal Tea Tree while the southern boundary is a tunnel of New Zealand Flax.  Both have peepholes and multiple entry and exit points allowing children to move in and out of the tunnels.

Children’s Kitchen Garden
Children of all abilities can get their hands dirty in the kitchen garden, an area that features interesting, unusual and common fruits, vegetables and herbs.  Children can propagate plants in the Potting Shed and plant in the kitchen garden with assistance from horticultural staff.

The Rill
Patterned to resemble an old river, water flowing along the rill has its beginnings in the rainforest, meanders through the lawn, and flows into the wetland pond.