Atlas Cedar

An Atlas cedar in a European park is safer than one at home. This page maps every atlas cedar on the site, 14 so far across 12 cities.

Cedrus atlantica grows wild in a narrow band of mountains in Morocco and Algeria, and the IUCN now lists the species as endangered there, squeezed by drought, logging and a warming climate its range cannot outrun. In a nineteenth century garden it has none of those problems, which is why the eleven mapped here are mostly enormous and mostly untroubled. Lyon's is the reason its park has the shape it does, with the lawn and paths arranged to give the tree room rather than the other way round. Perugia's took the weight of a trumpeter and an accordionist playing a concert twelve metres up in its crown in 2020. Lucca's carries the name of a priest who from 1943 hid Jews and partisans in his community's house. Nine cities so far.

Madrid

Photo: Luis Fernandez Garcia (CC BY 3.0)

The Grandfather Cedar of Parque del Oeste

over 150 years (precise age not confirmed) · Moncloa-Aravaca

Known locally as El Abuelo, the grandfather, this Atlas cedar grows near the Fuente de la Salud and the artificial stream that cuts through the northern part of Parque del Oeste, a park built on fo...

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Dublin

The Glasnevin Atlas Cedar

roughly 120-165 years · Glasnevin

The Atlas Mountains cedar growing in Glasnevin is safer here than at home.

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Bologna

The Atlas Cedar of Villa delle Rose

not documented · Saragozza

Five metres forty-five around the trunk, thirty-two metres tall, and it grows in the garden of an art gallery.

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Porto

The Atlas Cedar of Quinta Primo Madeira

100+ years · Lordelo do Ouro e Massarelos

Three named architects have worked on this small garden, and the trees outlasted every plan.

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The Atlas Cedar of the Botanical Garden

unknown · Lordelo do Ouro

Of the three cedar species growing in this collection, the Atlas cedar is the one a local garden writer singled out as the most beautiful, an unusually direct piece of praise to volunteer about one...

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Geneva

The Atlas Cedar of Parc La Grange

Eaux-Vives

Parc La Grange keeps two enormous cedars from two different mountain ranges.

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Lyon

The Atlas Cedar of Parc de la Chapelle

locally claimed at 500 years, botanically disputed · Champvert, 9th arrondissement

This cedar is effectively the reason the park around it exists in its current shape: much of Parc de la Chapelle is built around a single enormous specimen, with the site's open lawn and paths arra...

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Lucca

The Cedar of the Righteous at Villa Bottini

undated, and no older than the 1840s · Centro Storico

On 25 April 2021 this cedar was given a name.

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Granada

The Cedars of Carmen de la Victoria

centenarian, undated · Albaicin

Two Atlas cedars rise well above the great white perimeter wall of Carmen de la Victoria, tall enough to be one of the first things a visitor sees climbing the Cuesta del Chapiz toward the Albaicin...

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Bergamo

The Atlas Cedar of Parco Caprotti

Citta Bassa

Bergamo's own green space writers call Parco Caprotti perhaps the least known park in the lower town, which is a strange thing to say about a garden holding a 25 metre Atlas cedar, a sequoia and a...

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