Life in green. Our gardens / our futures 2025

Throughout the weekend, nurserymen specializing in Mediterranean gardening and advocates of agro-ecology offer plants and botanical advice at an astonishing plant market nestling in the courtyard of the Commande.

Unlike conventional plant markets, all the producers selected are committed to organic farming and the protection of living organisms.
The public will be able to find a variety of Mediterranean plants: cacti, perennials, herb and vegetable plants, tree shoots, climbers, creepers, seeds…

The Mucem also invites local and regional artisans and designers who place plants at the heart of their expertise. Come and discover a selection of plant-based products: floral waters and cosmetics, dried flower bouquets, spirits, ceramics, jewelry and natural dyes… Visit Place d’Armes to extend your experience and explore the world of plants and gardens!

In the Mucem dock, come and visit the Bourlingue & Pacotille boat, a cooperative that sails products from Mediterranean peasant agriculture.

The Garden of Migrations is a veritable showcase garden, offering a journey through the history of Mediterranean vegetation and its uses. It illustrates the intermingling of cultures in the Mediterranean and tells the story of the bond that has united people and plants for millennia.

To take part, go directly to the Fort Saint Jean ticket office at the time of your visit.

The National Park’s eco-guards join forces with the scientific mediation association Les Petits Débrouillards to help you discover the treasures of the calanques’ coastal flora.

Coastal plants are evolutionary jewels which, over the millennia, have adapted to the extreme conditions of the seaside: drought, lack of soil, wind, salt… A series of games and activities invite you to get to know them better and find out how you can help protect them.

Vegan sur Mars and Terre de Mars offer organic and vegetarian catering. On the menu: plant-based tacos, pesto gnocchi, revisited dahl, homemade lemonades and gourmet snacks… Recipes where plant-based, organic and local ingredients are at the heart of the plate.

On the occasion of International Cloud Day, Marc-André Sélosse and Marine de Guglielmo Weber discuss current issues linked to soil and weather modification. What are the impacts on our relationship with living things and on climate change?
As a living layer of the geosphere, the soil is an essential resource that feeds us, stores organic matter, loads nutrients and mineral salts into rivers and oceans, and creates water reserves from which humans and plants draw. So why do we ignore it and treat it so badly?

Artificialization, pollution, destruction, overexploitation… what lessons can we learn and what links can we make with the new practice of certain countries seeding clouds and modifying the weather to “make it rain”?

Initiated in 2022 by writer and former lawyer Mathieu Simonet, International Cloud Day is both artistic and political, with the aim of giving clouds legal status and proposing their inclusion in UNESCO’s World Heritage List. Some fifty countries manipulate clouds to make rain or prevent hail. Yet this technique, known as “cloud seeding”, is unregulated, raising a number of geopolitical and environmental questions. What is the history of weather modification, who is seeding the clouds today, and what relationship to the environment do these practices reflect? What forms of controversy and conflict does cloud seeding give rise to, at a time of dwindling water resources?

Marine de Guglielmo Weber holds a doctorate in Information and Communication Sciences from the University of Paris 8, and is a researcher in environment, energy and strategic raw materials in the Armement et économie de défense (AED) department. She works on climate security for populations and armed forces, and specializes in issues linked to weather and climate modification techniques (geoengineering). She is the author of a climate anticipation novel (L’Eau qui reste), an investigation into geo-engineering (Le Grand Retournement, co-written with Rémi Noyon) and a geopolitical work on the same subject (Géopolitique des nuages).

Marc-André Sélosse, born March 29, 1968, is a professor at the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle in Paris and at the universities of Gdansk (Poland) and Kunming (China), where he heads research teams. He has taught in Viçosa (Brazil) and is a lecturer at Ecole Normale Supérieure, Science Po and Hautes Etudes Commerciales (HEC). His work focuses on the ecology and evolution of mutual benefit associations (symbioses). A mycologist and botanist, he works in particular on mycorrhizal symbioses, which unite soil fungi with plant roots. President of BioGée, member of the Académie d’Agriculture de France and the Institut Universitaire de France, he is editor of four international scientific journals and of the popular magazine Espèce. He has published over 230 research articles and 330 popular articles, all of which can be downloaded from his website, and a hundred or so videos on YouTube. He has published books for the general public, notably on microbiota (Jamais seul, 2017), tannins (Les goûts et les couleurs du monde, 2019) and soil (L’origine du Monde, 2021), man’s place in nature (Nature et Préjugés, 2024), as well as his chronicles broadcast on France-Inter (Petites histoires naturelles, 2021), published by Actes Sud. He is co-author of a comic strip on soil with Mathieu Burniat (Sous Terre, 2021, Dargaud). He was awarded the Homme-Nature prize by the Sommer 2020 Foundation. Website: Marc-André SELOSSE | Institut de Systématique, Évolution, Biodiversité

Maxime de Rostolan trained as an engineer. After a 2-year world tour on the trail of local water issues, he headed the Deyrolle publishing house. He then discovered biomimicry and permaculture, and founded the Fermes d’Avenir association, with which he promotes agroecology. In 2019, he launched the citizen lobbying movement La Bascule and, more recently, the Planteurs project, which creates participatory nurseries dedicated to agroforestry, and Sailcoop, the first passenger sailing cooperative. He regularly contributes to the programming of events and festivals.

Discover an ephemeral tattoo workshop, led by Marseille-based artist Henna Dadou d’Orient, exploring motifs inspired by both the plant world and International Cloud Day, under the inspiring theme of life in green.

Mucem’s gardeners invite you to discover Mediterranean plants through a small workshop using vegetable inks, featuring pomegranate and madder.

To take part, go directly to the Fort Saint-Jean ticket office at workshop time.

Adapting our urban spaces to global warming, combating soil artificialization, providing access to food for a greater number of people, creating social links. To what extent is urban gardening a way of militating for greater ecology and solidarity in our lives?
From Pantin to Marseille, Ophélie Damblé and Alina Bekka share their experiences, their commitments, their advice and their dreams when it comes to urban agriculture and shared gardens.

After a reconversion that she’s been recounting in video since 2017, Ophélie Damblé, aka Ta Mère Nature, is setting up quarters at Cité Fertile (Pantin, Seine-Saint-Denis) in July 2020 and creating a laboratory for experimentation around urban agriculture, running a neighborhood nursery, workshops for young and old, and digital content. She is also the author of Guide Botanique des plantes dont tout le monde s’en fout (Editions Solar, 2024), Opération Bye Bye Béton with Roca Balboa (Editions La Ville Brûle, 2022), Manifeste pratique de végétalisation urbaine, 50 actions coups de green pour changer la ville sans la quitter (Editions Solar, 2020), Guerrilla Green with Kookie Kalkair (Editions BOOM!, 2019).

Alina Bekka is co-director of the Cité de l’agriculture, an association based in Marseilles that makes urban agriculture and sustainable food, accessible to all, essential levers for ecological and social transformation. Both a laboratory and a space for cooperation, it works in the field (Capri farm, mobile grocery store) while supporting, training and federating local players to drive collective dynamics towards fairer, more nourishing cities.

Jean-Laurent Félizia is a landscape architect. In 1999, he founded the company “Mouvements et paysages” and has been involved in the creation and supervision of numerous gardens in the Mediterranean region, including the Mucem in Marseille. He is also a director of the Domaine du Rayol, where he has been head gardener since its creation.

During an outing, you’ll meet the plants that have accompanied mankind for millennia, listen to the myths and legends associated with trees and herbaceous plants, and discover the ancient and traditional uses – from ritual to treatment – that reveal the richness and finesse of past worlds.

To take part, go directly to the Fort Saint-Jean ticket office at workshop time.