Botanischer Garten München-Nymphenburg, Munich

Botanischer Garten München-Nymphenburg is a botanical garden and arboretum adjoining Nymphenburg Palace Park. Its grounds cover about 21 hectares and cultivate roughly 16,000 plant species, while the garden welcomes more than 350,000 visitors each year. The glasshouses are the visual highlight: Ludwig Ullmann created their delicate iron, timber, and glass construction between 1910 and 1912, with a total area of about 4,500 square metres.

Inside, you encounter plants from humid tropical regions, cool mountain forests, and deserts. The outdoor grounds bring together a rose garden, an arboretum, an alpine garden beside the Großer Teich, and areas devoted to useful and medicinal plants. Their arrangement reflects the garden reform of its time, with clear, regular garden sections near the buildings and landscape scenes such as heath and wetland.

The garden opened in May 1914 after only three years of construction, and its centenary was celebrated in May 2014. During the winter months from December to March, a tropical glasshouse becomes a rainforest setting where more than 400 butterfly species fly freely. Look at the glasshouse structure itself: its fine framework makes the building feel unusually light, even at this generous scale.