Botanic beauty: the Diaspora in Cornwall

The beautiful Diaspora Gardens at Heartlands - a public park created from part of the mining landscape at South Crofty Mine - are the jewel in the crown of this site that celebrates Cornish history.

Situated between Camborne and Redruth, Heartlands is also home to a large playpark, museum, craft shops and an atmospheric cafe in the old carpenters' workshop. But in the bright sunshine of the Cornish spring, it is the arc of gardens planted to celebrate and commemorate the Cornish who took their mining skills across the world that steals the show.

The site was opened in 2012. Their Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall performed the official opening, unveiling an engraved stone close to the opening of Robinson's Shaft. The engine house and headgear here dominates the skyline of the site, yet it is the crescent of the Diaspora Gardens - just beyond a small lake - that invite the passer-by to enter.

Across the bridge from the headgear, a diverse collection of greenery from around the world awaits discovery, along with some embedded brass plates for rubbing with wax crayons. All the views from the gardens are focussed on the engine house and headgear, as if to reflect on the skills of the miners that facilitated their travel, and to ruminate on landscapes left behind.

Click below to see the map, take a look at some of the historical connections to these far-flung continents.

Explore the Diaspora Gardens