Address: via Orto botanico 15, 35123, Padua
Opening hours from May to September: Tuesday to Sunday and all holidays from 10.00 am to 7.00 pm (last admission 6.15 pm); closed on weekdays.
Online ticket office: www.ortobotanicopd.it
The oldest Botanical Garden in the western world
The Botanical Garden of the University of Padua was founded in 1545 at the request of Francesco Bonafede, professor of ‘materia medica’ at the University of Padua, to facilitate the recognition of medicinal plants by students. A piece of land belonging to the Benedictine Order was identified for the site, where the monks probably already cultivated medicinal plants. Work began immediately and the involvement of architect Andrea Moroni in their execution is documented. Today’s structure is essentially that of the original project. Over the following centuries, a number of changes were made, including, in 1704, the addition of four monumental entrances surmounted by acroteria, stone vases with rare iron plants, and, at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, the new masonry greenhouses with cast-iron columns, equipped with modern heating systems. Various fountains and sculptures, an arboretum, a grove of exotic trees and conifers with winding paths, according to landscape taste, and a small hillock-belvedere were added between the 17th and 18th centuries. In addition to the living collections, a valuable herbarium was built in the Orto in 1835. Today, it has become a museum with around 500,000 specimens from all over the world, collected since the end of the 18th century. After the acquisition of a neighbouring area, expansion work began in May 2002, born out of the need to protect the historical Garden from external environmental attacks, and in 2015 the “Garden of Biodiversity” was inaugurated, a contribution that our age leaves to this place with almost five hundred years of history.
MORE INFORMATION: www.gardenrouteitalia.it
