Zagreb Botanical Garden

The botanical garden was founded in 1889 by Antun Heinz for the university and laid out over about five hectares in the English landscape manner, with an arboretum, ponds, a rock garden and glasshouses, and it forms one link in Lenuci's Green Horseshoe - the sequence of squares and parks that the nineteenth century plan wrapped around the lower town. It holds more than 10,000 plant species, with a serious collection of Croatian flora including karst and coastal species grown in the rockery. It is free to enter and closes entirely for the winter months, reopening in spring, and the glasshouses have been restored in stages.

History

The idea of a university botanical garden came from Bohuslav Jiruš, the first lecturer in botany at the University of Zagreb, and his successor Antun Heinz founded it in 1889. After a year touring the botanical gardens of Europe, Heinz drew up the plan with the head gardener Viteslav Durhanek; building began in 1890, the garden opened to the public in 1891 and the first planting was under way by 1892. The plants were arranged both by their relationships and for visual harmony - most of the garden in the informal English landscape manner, the flower parterre by the glasshouse in the symmetrical French style - and a glasshouse, a gardener's house, a pavilion, ponds and fountains were added. In 1908 the garden's first collecting expedition brought back 128 native species from around Zagreb, Samobor and Gorski Kotar. Today it covers 5 hectares and holds more than 10,000 species, 1,800 of them exotic, and the painter Slava Raškaj made some of her best-known works by its ponds (Wikipedia, Zagreb Botanical Garden).

Highlights

• A garden from 1889 - laid out for the university in landscape style.
• Part of the Green Horseshoe - the lower town's ring of parks.
• Croatian karst and coastal flora - grown in the rock garden.
• Free entry - and closed for the winter.

When to go

April to October; it is shut through winter. Two hours.

Before you go

Winter visits are impossible - the gates are locked from autumn. Some glasshouses have been closed for restoration at times. It sits beside the railway station, so trains are audible. It is a city garden rather than a large botanic institution.

Nearby

The railway station is opposite; the lower town squares run north.

Key facts