Triana's landmark tree began as a pot plant.
Rubber Fig
Ficus elastica
Most people know Ficus elastica as the thing in the corner of the living room that stops when it hits the ceiling. We map 3 of them, in 3 cities.
On Drosopoulou Street in Athens it is 26.55 metres tall, higher than the apartment blocks either side of it. Seville's began as one of those: a containerised specimen the city kept for dressing squares during celebrations, put into the ground in 1972 beside a monument to a bullfighter and left there. Fifty four years later its trunk is 5.86 metres round and its crown covers the whole of the Plaza del Altozano, the only shade on it. Lisbon's got out of a cracked pot in Mouraria and drove its roots into the street between two building fronts, and nobody can say who put the pot there or when. Three cities, three trees, and two of them were once in a pot.
Seville
Lisbon
The Giant Rubber Tree of MourariaUrban curiosity
Nobody knows how this tree got here, and that is most of its appeal.
Athens
Most people know Ficus elastica as a houseplant that tops out against a ceiling.
Explore by city: Seville · Lisbon · Athens · Prague · Brussels · Porto · Brisbane · Munich · every city · or browse all species.