As she envisioned a refresh of the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens campus in downtown Sarasota, president Jennifer Rominiecki had just one request for her team: Make the project as green as possible. “They exceeded my wildest expectations,” she says—several years, a three-building complex, and fifty thousand square feet of solar panels later, the space is now the first botanical garden complex in the world to generate more energy than it consumes. A new plant research center harbors more than 125,000 pressed specimens along with the planet’s second largest collection of liquid-preserved specimens. At the Green Orchid restaurant, named for the rare plants in Selby’s 4,400-strong orchid collection, instead of using gas or flame for hot dishes, cooks use electromagnetic fields to heat pots and pans. Seasonal greens and veggies come from the onsite rooftop garden—in late summer, garlic chives, arugula, eggplant, and edible cosmos flowers grow just steps away.
Southern Agenda