Titanic Memorial Garden

Located on the east side of Belfast City Hall, the garden is set on two levels with the upper level containing a nine metre long plinth, inscribed with the names of those who died on RMS Titanic and a lower grassed terrace surrounding the existing monument.

The garden's memorial plinth supports fifteen bronze plaques which list, in alphabetical order, the names of 1,512 people who perished on RMS Titanic.

When the plaques were being designed, it was believed that a complete list of names was already in existence, however this was not the case.

Many existing lists documented the First Class, Second Class and Steerage, but did not necessarily include all the crew members, the Guarantee Group, the postal workers and the musicians. This is the first time that the names of everyone who perished have been recorded on one monument. 'The Belfast List' as it is now known, is a key feature of the memorial garden.

Plants chosen for the garden have been selected to display good seasonal interest particularly in the springtime, around the period when the Titanic disaster occurred.

Whether through foliage, flowers or bark, the garden's colour theme is predominantly a range of whites, silvers, blues and greens. These colours have been chosen to reflect the colours of water and ice and to encourage a sense of contemplation and a feeling of relative peace and rest.

Two multi-stem Betula utilis var. jacquemontii (Himalayan birch) have been planted either side of the memorial plinth. These birch trees have spectacular white bark and mature into particularly elegant and graceful trees.

Other feature plants include the beautiful Magnolia x soulangeana 'Alba Superba', or tulip magnolia and a selection of white shrub roses including Rosa 'Claire Austin' and Rosa 'Lichfield Angel'.

Some of the plants provide hints to the background story to the garden, the blue forget-me-nots, the fragrant rosemary (rosemary symbolising remembrance), the attractive Magnolia stellata or star magnolia, providing white star shaped flowers between March and April, and of course the birch (symbolising renewal).