At 100, the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden Is Mostly Planting for Its Second Century

"They're young," Keith Nevison said of the newest trees at the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden, "but with some TLC, this forest is going to be very impressive over time."

Nevison is the Garden's director of horticulture and operations. He was talking to the Santa Barbara Independent in March about a hillside of Torrey pine saplings next to the Conservation Center. The Garden may need 50 to 80 years to see that grove at full size. That timeline sums up the centennial year. A garden founded in Mission Canyon in 1926 is using its anniversary to plant, archive, and fund things for 2126. Its three remaining free Sundays this October are a good chance to see that work while it is still knee-high.

A grove measured in decades

The Torrey Pine Conservation Grove was years in the making. Every sapling grew from seed collected from 45 maternal trees on Santa Rosa Island. The young trees were then moved to the sloped hillside beside the Garden's conservation center, a site Nevison called a "blank canvas." The Independent called the Torrey pine one of the rarest pine trees in the world. The Garden presents the grove as a way to walk through an island forest without leaving the mainland.

Two things on the grounds show how fast it may grow. Torrey pines planted around the Garden about ten years ago are already taller than an average person. Scot Pipkin, the Garden's director of education, also compared the new grove to the early days of the redwood forest. Those redwoods went in during the 1920s and now tower overhead. You can see both ends of that hundred-year story in a single walk. One end is the redwood canopy that founding-era staff planted. The other is a stand of pines about waist-high that today's staff will mostly not see grown.

The redwoods were saplings once, and the archive proves it

The Garden's centennial exhibition puts that comparison on a wall. Still Growing: 100 Years of California's Native Plants fills the Pritzlaff Conservation Center Gallery with more than 200 archival photographs. A QR-code digital companion tells the story behind each image. The show runs from June 6, 2026, through March 21, 2027. Anyone who misses it this month has the whole winter. The Garden also opened public Digital Archives alongside the exhibition. They hold historic photos, documents, botanical records, publications, and artifacts.

The founding story is short and specific. A 1925 proposal from the Carnegie Institution and the Museum of Natural History brought plant ecologist Dr. Frederic Clements to Santa Barbara to find a site. In 1926, philanthropist Anna Dorinda Blaksley Bliss bought 13 acres in Mission Canyon as a memorial to her father, Henry Blaksley, and gave an endowment. Dr. Elmer J. Bissell became the first director. Lockwood de Forest was named botanist in 1928. Today the Garden calls itself the first botanic garden in the United States devoted solely to native plants. Its own history says the focus narrowed to California natives by 1936.

To see that history on the ground, try the new Centennial Route. It's a self-guided map with three walking routes of different lengths and terrain. Its historic stops include:

1. Mission Dam, at the "Pre-Garden" marker. The route guide identifies it as an 1806 reservoir built by Chumash people who were conscripted by Franciscan friars.
2. Blaksley Boulder, named for the family whose land purchase started the Garden.
3. The Desert Section.
4. The Redwood Section, where the 1920s plantings stand.

The Mission Dam stop matters for the timeline. The ground the Garden calls its starting point was shaped more than a century before Bliss bought it.

What the $30 million is meant to build

On October 1, the Garden announced a $30 million Centennial Campaign, split evenly into three parts. Ten million goes to community programs, ten million to capital improvements, and ten million to the endowment. The capital plans are the part a regular visitor will eventually notice. They call for better ADA access throughout the Garden and improved pathways. The existing Garden Shop building would get an interior remodel into a visitor center, with its exterior preserved. A food service window would offer beverages, sandwiches, salads, and snacks. These are campaign goals. The announcement gives no construction timetable, so none of it is open yet.

The campaign also shows how much the Garden's work has grown beyond Mission Canyon. In 2010 it had two offsite projects. Today it has more than 50 active conservation projects, reaching from Mendocino County to Baja California and east to the Sierra Nevada. Its Seed Bank holds nearly 5 million seeds safeguarding more than 400 at-risk species. Closer to home, its native plantings include sites along State Street and at Elings Park, Alice Keck Park Memorial Gardens, and Hammond's Meadow County Open Space. "Our next chapter is about putting that knowledge to work," said executive director Steve Windhager. Mark Funk and Nancy Weiss co-chair the campaign's steering committee.

Three Sundays left, each with its own theme

The free October Sundays follow the same forward-looking logic. The Garden describes its Centennial Community Days as a way to carry the legacy forward by lowering barriers to access. The first one, on October 4, has passed. Three remain, and each opens a themed week.

The October 18 storytimes have two readers. At 11 a.m., Godmother's staff will read Luna Oscura by author and illustrator Heidi Moreno. At 2 p.m., actress and author Sarah Wright Olsen will read her picture book When I Am Not with You. That week also includes a Santa Barbara Public Library storytime at Elings Park on Saturday, October 24. The Pooch Parade offers prizes, including a grand prize of a Garden dog membership.

Families on the October 18 Sunday can also visit the Backcountry casitas. These three play installations opened in October 2025: "Gnome Home" by Matthew Caligiure of Allen Construction, "Live Oak Loop" by Kylie Schmidt of Schmidt Studios, and "Tres Osos Negros" by Cody and Karen Westheimer of New West Studios.

Admission is free on each Community Day, but you need an advance reservation because of parking and capacity limits. Each confirmed reservation includes one free parking space for a standard-sized vehicle, and the Garden encourages carpooling. Posted hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with the last reservation at 4 p.m. Leashed dogs are welcome and get in free. Vehicles over 31 feet are not allowed. Booking a time slot is part of the plan for the day, not a formality.

The centennial at the bar

The anniversary also reaches restaurants this month through "Garden to Glass." It's a lineup of limited-edition cocktails built around California native plants sourced from the Garden, running October 1 through 31. The participating spots are Barbareño, Bistro Amasa, Convivo, Finch & Fork, La Paloma, Little Dom's, Monte's, The Good Lion, The Lark, and Third Window Brewing. Each featured cocktail sends $1 to the Garden's conservation, research, and education work. A Sunday reservation in Mission Canyon and a drink downtown afterward add up to a simple way to spend an afternoon on the anniversary.

An older botanic garden, getting new paths

Mission Canyon is not the only place where someone planted for the long run. The City of Santa Barbara began a multi-week trail project at Franceschi Park in August. The 17-acre park is the property where horticulturist Dr. Francesco Franceschi set up a nursery and botanic garden in the early 1900s. Crews are building more than 1,500 linear feet of new trail. It will connect the parking lot, the sandstone Franceschi Bust, the upper meadow, and the existing paths, passing through eucalyptus, towering cacti, and oaks. Three new benches made from repurposed wood are part of the plan. The City's August 26 notice said the trail work would continue into October, with native habitat restoration to start in winter. No completion has been announced yet, so expect some sections to still be under work.

Marisa Garber lives in Montecito and has served on the Auxiliary Board of the Music Academy of the West. She follows how places like the Botanic Garden shape daily life on this stretch of coast. If a Sunday in Mission Canyon has you thinking about a home or garden you plan to hold for a long time, Marisa Garber is glad to talk it through. Let's Connect.