I recently had the opportunity to chat with the new director of the South Carolina Botanical Garden (SCBG) at Clemson University, Dr. Martin Hamilton. I hadn’t seen or spoken with Martin in at least two decades, so it was great to catch up, and hear about all that is happening at SCBG. Since joining the garden in August of 2023, Martin and the SCBG team have been working to secure funding to address many long-term, deferred maintenance issues related to the garden’s infrastructure (bridges, roads, leaky buildings, etc.), replacing a good bit of worn-out equipment, as well as hiring new garden staff. All the while looking to build their endowment. As I mentioned in my previous blogs, strong endowments bring stability to gardens.

Unfortunately, Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc at SCBG, and the Garden lost many trees in the storm and suffered considerable damage resulting in a two-week total closure. Recovery will continue for many months as the focus turns from clean-up of debris and damaged trees to repairing fences, bridges and other structures that were damaged because of the storm.
I was incredibly encouraged to hear Martin’s vision for the future of the garden, since we need SCBG to be a strong leader in the regional gardening community. SCBG is actively involved in material sharing with many other gardens and private collectors. I emphasized that we would like to re-share any of the plant material previously sourced from SCBG. As happened after the demise of Heronswood, and it’s eventual resurgence, many of the plants lost from the collection that had been propagated and shared with others over the years, were subsequently re-gifted to the garden, emphasizing the critical nature of propagating and sharing.
We encourage you to help support the South Carolina Botanical Garden as it looks to the future. Here’s to a great bounce back story that we’ll continue to watch and cheer for.
Hope they can turn that garden around as I was quite disappointed to hear that it has been so neglected. Last time I visited was when Patrick was still there and I was blown away with what he had done.