Desert Botanical Garden

Nestled amid the red buttes of Papago Park, the Desert Botanical Garden hosts one of the world's finest collections of desert plants. Founded in 1939, this one-of-a-kind museum showcases 50 acres of beautiful outdoor exhibits. Home to 139 rare, threatened and endangered plant species from around the world, the Garden offers interesting and inspiring experiences to more than 300,000 visitors each year. The Garden's commitment to the community is to advance excellence in education, research, exhibition, and conservation of desert plants of the world with emphasis on the Sonoran Desert. We will ensure that the Garden is always a compelling attraction that brings to life the many wonders of the desert.

The Garden’s vision is to be the premier center in the world for the exhibition, research and conser

Goal One: The first goal is to complete the Hazel Hare Center for Plant Conservation, an 85,000-square-foot Center where our staff grow, study, and take care of a world-class collection of desert plants.

Goal Two: Another goal is to expand educational and recreational programming for children. Children that spend time in nature at a young age are more likely to become stewards of the natural world.

Goal Three: A third goal is to increase attendance among children and their families, the LatinX community, and millennials.

The Garden was awarded a prestigious Museums Empowered three-year grant for $250,000 from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). This award allowed for the development of “Cultivating Excellence,” a robust professional development program that includes leadership training that assists in building great leaders and more inclusive and effective teams. In addition, the program includes mandatory diversity and inclusion trainings, which lays the groundwork for understanding diversity and inclusion, creating awareness, and showing ways to demonstrate inclusion in everything we do.

In response to the pandemic, the Garden implemented stringent operating procedures to keep our staff and visitors safe. We also realized that the Garden could be a place of healing and respite for everyone, young and old, and we created novel outdoor experiences for our guests to enjoy safely. First up was the stunning work of Waterlily Pond Studio: Wind, Water, and Earth. Then, in the summer, we reinvented Flashlight Nights and curated special outdoor, after-dark events for families in search of safe and “cool” experiences. Finally, in December, we brought back the work of master glass artist Dale Chihuly. The Garden continued to reimagine its approach to educational offerings through the challenges of the pandemic. We piloted a safe re-opening of Cactus Clubhouse, a nature play space for children, and allowed kids and their families to connect with nature. Forty-two mentors and youth were able to visit the Garden through The Happiness Tour in partnership with New Pathways for youth. In 2021, the Garden hosted three school outreach events, 419 Cactus Clubhouse Visitors, three Girl Scout Events with 50 children in attendance, and 3,693 Flashlight Nights guests. The Garden also stepped up to address poaching, a huge problem affecting cactus worldwide. Nearly a third of cactus are at risk of extinction— primarily from smugglers who illegally remove them from their native habitats. Smuggled cactus can’t be planted in just any random place in the wild. Doing so could harm the resident population of a genetically different population of the same species. Because authorities usually don’t know where these plants came from, they send confiscated plants to designated plant rescue centers like the Garden. In 2021, the Garden cared for 104 smuggled/confiscated cactus.