Company's Gardens

The Company's Gardens is a park and heritage site located in central Cape Town.

Also known as Company's Garden, Het Kompanje's Tuin, Die Kompanjiestuin, the Cape Gardens, The Gardens, .

History

Originally created in 1652 by the Dutch East India Company to grow fresh produce to replenish ships rounding the Cape on their way to the east, this park, it gradually became the cultural hub of Cape Town. In and surrounding it one finds numerous memorials as well as an outdoor restaurant and tearoom, the South African Houses of Parliament, Tuynhuys (the official residence of the president), the South African Museum, the South African National Gallery, the National Library of South Africa, St George's Cathedral, the Slave Lodge, The Centre for the Book, the South African Jewish Museum, the Cape Town Holocaust Centre and the famous Mount Nelson Hotel nearby.

Besides being an extremely popular public space, the Gardens themselves (or various spaces in it) have over the centuries been used as performance spaces or venues for festivals, fairs and fêtes, and sites for large public events and demonstrations.