The Seed

Saw the amazing sculpture by Peter Randall-Page's whilst visiting the Eden Project. The monumental seed-shaped sculpture. 

'One of the biggest sculptures in history made from a single piece of rock, the Seed started life as a 167-tonne boulder extracted from De Lank Quarry, Cornwall. At 70-tonnes it weighs as much as 10 elephants. It is made of prime silver-grey Cornish granite estimated to be 300 million years old. Carved into its surface is a pattern as intricate as the head of a sunflower.Its creator Peter Randall-Page says: "The sculpture within the chamber will, I hope, be an object of contemplation and meditation, a still quiet hub; both fossil and seed. The result of this collaboration … unite concept and form, object and structure, art and architecture in a unique and cohesive whole.” 

http://www.edenproject.com/whats-it-all-about/climate-and-environment/sustainability-at-eden/how-we-built-the-core

...its really jaw dropping as you walk along the darkened corridor and enter the space - the scale and 'whiteness' of the piece - really stunning. lovely sense of calm, 

working stages of the creation of the Seed.

above is a short video about the sculpture

A 70-tonne granite sculpture of a seed has been 'planted' at the Eden Project in Cornwall.

The 13ft (4m) high work is the centrepiece of Eden's new £15m Core education centre.

The seed was lowered into a circular room at the heart of The Core in front of visitors at the attraction.

The seed took Devon sculptor Peter Randall-Page four years to create. It was funded by Simon Robertson, an Eden trustee and chairman of Rolls-Royce.

The sculpture was transported by lorry from the De Lank Quarry on Bodmin Moor on Sunday.

Eden's director of learning, Dr Jo Elworthy, said Seed is symbolic of Eden's ecological and environmental image.

She said: ''Seed and the Core pay homage to nature, efficiency and collaboration.

''Take the sunflower as an example. The giant bloom is made of hundreds of little flowers that combine together to create a massive functional landing pad for bees.

'Its efficiency and strength symbolises what can be achieved when people work closely, both together and with the grain of nature.

''We're planting the Seed in the middle of the Core to symbolise the next stage in Eden's development - to sow ideas for the 21st Century and work towards a world we want to live in.''

Mr Randall-Page said he wanted to make a sculpture "whose mass would almost totally fill an architectural space offering an awe-inspiring experience".

He said: "The shape of the chamber echoes that of the stone, like a seed in its pod.

"The space between the sculpture and the walls will create extraordinary spatial drama."