Alcázar Vegetal

The Alcazar of Seville, the oldest royal residence in use in Europe, is an essential node within the network of gardens that along the history of gardening and agriculture have served as laboratories of acclimatization and dispersal of plant species on the planet. It is a conglomerate of gardens created by different cultures. A palimpsest in which new species have been inserted depending on the inhabitants who lived in the fortress, as well as influenced by the exchange networks that they established with the rest of the world.

The gardens have more than 20.000 plants belonging, at least, to 183 different species; and that are organized into three groups: Islamic gardens, Renaissance and Modern ones. From this perspective, the unique distribution of species in the gardens of the Alcazar is the result of a slow overlay made by many travelers throughout history.

The following is an interactive visualization showing the amount of plants per species and their average proximity with plants of other species. Species connected with thicker strokes are spatially closer than others. The idea behind this project is to study spatial correlations between historical developments in the garden, and inter-species compatibility.



Credits

The Alcazar Vegetal project was originally conceptualized by Nomad Garden, and developed at the FORMA'13 workshop

Data processing: Daniel Márquez Quintanilla

Visualization: Jaime de Miguel Rodríguez