Garden Gallery

The Belfast Botanic and Horticultural Society established the Botanic Gardens in 1828. The gardens was private until 1895, when the Belfast Corporation (present-day Belfast City Council) bought the site and opened it to the public. The gardens includes two glasshouses--the Palmhouse and the Tropical Ravine. The Palmhouse, designed by Charles Lanyon and constructed by Richard Turner, dates from 1839 to 1840. The building is an early example of a curvilinear cast iron and glass structure with an elliptical dome that was added in 1852. Charles McKimm oversaw the construction of the Tropical Ravine, a rectangular conservatory with a balcony, completed in 1889.