Secret Garden

Just where you'd least expect it-amid a jumble of strip centers, chain restaurants and gas stations on busy Fourth Street, just north of downtown St. Petersburg-historic Sunken Gardens is an oasis of tropical splendor in the middle of an urban jungle.

Here on just four acres is a riot of more than 500 different plant species crowding up against meandering paths: nine-foot-tall bougainvillea in vivid colors, bright orange flame vines, delicate pink powder puffs and butter-yellow solandra, ginger, heliconia, plumeria and hibiscus. Impossibly large vines climb up live oaks, and the variety of palms and citrus trees is incredible. (In the succulent garden, look for the Hottentot fig from South Africa.)

How Sunken Gardens came about is also remarkable. In 1903, plumber George Turner Sr. bought the tiny property on the site of an ancient sinkhole to use as his own private garden. He drained a shallow lake that drops 10 feet below street level in order to provide rich soil to grow the tropical plants he collected from all over the world.

Twenty years later, he had created such a verdant little world that visitors paid 25 cents to wander through the lush landscape. In 1935, he officially opened it to the public as Turner's Sunken Gardens.

The royal palms are the oldest and largest in Tampa" target="_blank">Pinellas County, planted from seed by Turner in 1903; the pony tail palm (actually a member of the lily family, by the way) is the original that Turner planted in 1935; and the magnificent queen sagos (members of the cycad family of plants that date back to the dinosaurs) were sprouted from seed at the turn of the last century. When they reproduced in 1915, Turner was so excited that he sent a birth announcement to all the residents of St. Petersburg.

In 1967, the Turners purchased an adjacent 1926 Mediterranean Revival building on Fourth Street that for over 30 years had been a Coca-Cola bottling plant. They turned it into the World's Largest Gift Shop, with 30,000 kitschy Florida-themed knickknacks.

When the city of St. Petersburg purchased Sunken Gardens in 1999, it had lost its luster. The city embarked upon a major clean-up and reopened it a year later. A state grant took the Med-Rev building back to its original splendor. It now houses both the education center for Sunken Gardens and the Great Explorations children's science museum.

Today, visitors and school groups come to Sunken Gardens to marvel at its botanical wonders. Workshops in everything from growing ferns to bromeliads are held throughout the year, and the Upper Pinellas African Violet Society has held its annual judged show and sale there for 47 years.

"We consider it a living classroom," says longtime staffer Bill O'Grady-a secret garden no longer.

Ilene Denton is managing editor of Tampa Bay Homebuyer.