Record crowds for Edinburgh Botanic Lights

Botanic Lights, the outdoor lighting festival, illuminated the gardens after dark for 22 nights before closing last Sunday.

Officials said the third annual event had been “the most exciting”, almost doubling last year’s record 23,000 visitors.

Based on the theme “explore”, it highlighted the work that RBGE carries out across the world.

Visitors experienced sights and sounds of some of the world’s most exotic locations, following in the footsteps of the original plant-hunters.

One installation, the Chinese Hillside, depicted the story of George Forrest, sent by RBGE to China in 1904 to collect tens of thousands of plants and catalogue unknown species.

Heather Jackson, director of enterprise at the Botanics, said: “This year’s event proved to be the most exciting Botanic Lights that we have undertaken so far. We wanted to raise awareness and tell the story of our organisation, what we do and why. This was reflected in the content of the show, with representation from the many countries around the world in which we work.”