A Learned Journey Under the Canopy of the Living Giants – The King Palms

Superintendent Emeritus Timothy Lindsay conducted a 90-minute walking tour of the King Palm Forest, located on the east slope of The Virginia Robinson Gardens on October 28, 2023. Tim spent over 20 years restoring the forest by adding new plantings and designing water features that he interpreted while leading a public tour on Saturday, October 28^th, 2023. This is a synopsis of his learned journey under the canopy of the King Palm trees. 

The King Palm Forest on the east slope of the Robinson estate serendipitously arose from a failed attempt to grow a Mediterranean garden. The approximate two-acre piece of land that supports the King Palm Forest was first laid out as an intended extension of the Italian Terrace Garden, which still exists on the west side of the property. Sensibly, a Mediterranean-style garden was to embrace and enhance the Italian-style villa built and designed by Nathaniel Dryden, Virginia’s father.    

A garden is a great teacher for many of life’s important lessons once we learn to pay attention. In this area of the garden, a lack of full-day sun or a well-drained soil, led to the slow decline and loss of many of the Mediterranean plantings.  By the early 1930’s, Virginia reacted to the gradual, yet obvious decline of the Mediterranean-planted east slope and decided to hire the landscape architect Charles Gibbs Adams. It would be his job to re-image a new type of planting — a planting more appropriate for the characteristics of the site. Gibbs was a well-known landscape architect working in Los Angeles. It’s assumed he came as a referral from two of Virgnia’s Hollywood friends, Charlie Chaplin and George Cukor. For them, he had created a hillside tropical paradise, complete with a ten-foot waterfall. It is located in the area of Los Angeles known as Los Feliz. These fellow movie makers affectionally called their garden “The Park.” It served as an oasis — a think tank of sorts for Charlie, George, and W.C Fields to debate prospective ideas for new studio projects. Tim was privy to visit “The Park” in 1998 and concluded it must have served in large part, particularly in its planting scheme, as an inspiration for what became the “King Palm Forest” on the Robinson Estate.  

Today, the King Palm Forest has over 400 King Palms soaring vertically skyward that reach a mature height of 60 feet. Their collective canopy provides shade to hundreds of clivia planted on the forest floor. When in bloom from February to April, the clivia flowers provide a sea of brilliant tangerine orange as far as the eye can see. The pedestrian path that transverses the east slope allows visitors to enjoy the enormity of scale and the majesty of this forest. In addition to the tropical plantings, there is a wildlife pond and a melodious waterfall gently flowing down a rock-studded hillside. 

The King Palm Forest on the Robinson estate is thought to be the largest outside of Queensland and Australia, where they are native. As one visiting botanist from Queensland told Tim, it’s completely authentic and has everything but the “crocs.”  Past President Debra Shaw, who was an attendee, added, “As we walk through the Palm Garden, we can feel the temperature drop as well as our stress levels!”

Post by Timothy Lindsay
Superintendent Emeritus of The Virginia Robinson Gardens
Photos by Patty Elias and Debra Shaw
Friends of Robinson Gardens Members