eden-magazine-issue-26-summer-2015

Fifteen years in the pitJessi Hill, Apprentice, Eden Project Media TeamWith the 15th anniversary of the opening of The Eden Project coming up next spring,Media Relations apprentice Jessi Hill talks to horticulturists Catherine Cutler,Emma Gunn and Paul Stone about their memories from the early days of Eden.Paul’s first task at Eden was overseeingthe production of the manufacturedtopsoil.He says: ‘I wanted to be involvedwith a project that was clearly going tobe the biggest landscape project in thecountry in the year 2000. So I searchedfor the pit and I asked a man at theentrance gate, “Is this where Eden isgoing to be?” and he said, “The EdenProject? They’ll never buy this pit,” butwithin one year they had.’Emma started as a volunteer atEden and then secured the position ofdraftsman. But she wasn’t afraid to gether hands dirty.She recalls: ‘On my first day Icollected seed at the nursery from thetobacco plants we were growing. Theywere so sticky and it would affect youlike you’d been smoking, so we were allfeeling off our heads. That was quitean experience.’Catherine started off as ahorticulture supervisor to get theproject going and fill the site withplants.Catherine says: ‘On my first daythere were three of us and the firstthing we did was go into Tim Smit’soffice. He told us that they’d recruitedus because we were young enough notto know that what we were about to dowas impossible.‘Working on a building site washard, you’d go to plant up an area,but then somebody else would belaying a road or putting in pipes. The‘All of the horticulture team had green helmets on,so we stood out like a sore thumb and that’s how thebuilders coined the phrase the “green team”.’Emma Gunnconstruction workers loved what wewere doing though and worked wellwith us.’During the first few months ofconstruction it rained every day,sending 43 million litres of waterinto the pit, so a special drainagesystem was made. In the early stages ofplanting, giant sheets of plastic wereused to keep the elements away fromthe plants where there weren’t Biomebubbles to shelter them.Many of the plants were grownfrom seed at Watering Lane Nursery;others came from botanic gardens,research stations and supporters. Allplants went through Eden’s rigoroushealthcare programme to catch14