gardens belfast

The urban enviroment is an important part of Belfast's heritage and is enhanced by the unique blend of features and characters of the city many parks, old and new, large and small Annual events promote interest and activity in the parks, and include lectures, demonstrations, guided walks, bus tours, band performances, children's aciivities, outdoor summer schemes, educational programmes and major events such as Rose Week and the Spring and Autumn Flower Shows....

By the seventeenth century, roses were extensively grown in almost every European garden. Three hundred years later they remain firm favourites and nowhere more so than in Ulster - the home, for over a century, of two world-famous breeders: Dickson's of Newtownards and McCredy's of Portadown....

Its long and fascinating history began during the late 18th and early 19th centuries when there was an upsurge of interest in botany, horticulture and gardening, encouraged by the range of new plants being brought back from the East and the Americas by plant hunters.

The formation of "Botanic Gardens' became fashionable, and gardens had already been established in Dublin and Cork when the Belfast Botanic and Horticultural Society was formed in February 1827. Under its president, th...

The Palm House is one of the earliest examples of a curvilinear and cast iron glasshouse. Its construction was initiated by the Belfast Botanical and Horticultural Society in the 1830s. The two wings were completed in 1840, and were built by Richard Turner of Dublin, who later built the Great Palm House at Kew Gardens. The 37 foot high elliptical dome at Belfast was only added twelve years later.

Over the years the Palm House acquired a reputation for good plant collections, and the...