2024

Genomic Gastronomy Garden (GGG)

The GENOMIC GASTRONOMY GARDEN (GGG) grows and interprets edible plants. We study the technologies and ecologies of human food systems, tasting and debating the history and future of food.

The plants featured in the garden stretch the imagination towards outer space & deep time while grounding visitors in the here & now through a series of public activities that include community plantings, seed saving workshops, harvest parties, collaborative tastings and interpretive tours. The garden was established in Amsterdam’s Amstel Park in 2024.

The first part of the Genomic Gastronomy Garden to be established is the SATELLITE SEED SAVERS garden bed: consisting of a large dome made out of willow plants, with concentric circles of space seeds planted around the perimeter of the dome.

It is a site for assembling and distributing off-planet agricultural biodiversity and directing the visitors’ gaze upwards—connecting the plants in the garden to multi-species activities in the sky—asking questions about the human desire to explore and the biological drive to persist.

There are many local and national seed saving programs that preserve the historical agricultural biodiversity of a place, but who will assemble, maintain and propagate plant varieties that have been grown in, or cultivated for, outer space? Do plants grown in space have a home here on Earth?

During the 2023 growing season, Genomic Gastronomy began working with gardeners and researchers around the world to grow, taste, debate and preserve the agricultural biodiversity of outer space. When you visit the SATELLITE SEED SAVERS garden bed you can find 4 varieties of edible plants that each have an amazing story related to space research.

The Center of Genomic Gastronomy

The Netherlands
Food Systems / Agricultural Biodiversity