Royal Botanic Garden Madrid is a research center of the Higher Council for Scientific Research. Founded by RO of October 17, 1755 by King Fernando VI in Soto de Migas Calientes, Carlos III ordered the move to its current status in 1781, the Paseo del Prado, near the Natural History Museum being built (now Museo del Prado), Madrid, Spain. This botanical garden terraced houses in three plants of America and the Pacific, in addition to European plants.

History

Preamble:

Felipe II created the botanical garden at the request of the physician Andrés Laguna, next to the Palacio Real de Aranjuez. Fernando VI later settled in the capital the botanical garden, located in the Huerta de Migas Calientes (now Iron Gate on the River Manzanares) in 1755, creating the Royal Botanical Gardens. Had more than 2000 plants, collected by José Quer, botanist and surgeon in his many travels in the Iberian Peninsula and Europe, especially Italy where it was intended, or obtained by exchange with other European botanists. The continuous extension of the garden led to Carlos III gave instructions in 1774 to move to its present location in the Paseo del Prado in Madrid, under the management program Salón del Prado and Atocha.

 The Count of Floridablanca, prime minister of Carlos III, took special interest in moving the Garden to the meadow old Atocha. Not only because the project would beautify the Salón del Prado, but above all, because it would serve as a symbol of patronage of the Crown in the sciences and the arts. Do not forget that this area would be located Salón del Prado Royal Botanic Gardens addition, the Cabinet of Natural History (Museo del Prado later) and the Astronomical Observatory. One of the scientists involved in the construction project of the Royal Botanical Garden in the Prado was Prof. Casimiro Gómez Ortega.

Opening:

The first draft of the new garden was entrusted to Casimiro Gómez Ortega scientific adviser and architect Francesco Sabatini, who between 1774 and 1781 (opening year) made the initial trace, with a three-tier distribution, and part of the enclosure, the highlighting the Puerta Real (Paseo del Prado). On this basis, between 1785 and 1789 Juan de Villanueva made a second and final project, more rational and consistent with scientific and educational function that must have the garden. It occupied an area of 10 hectares divided into three terraced levels that were adapted to the terrain, barracks arranged in a square, following a route and topped octagonal corners with circular fountains. The two lower (Terrace Terrace Tables and Botanical Schools) remain today as they were built, while the upper (Plano Terrace Flower) was remodeled in the nineteenth century landscaped features. The exhibition was closed by an elegant iron fence, made of Tolosa (Guipúzcoa) set on a granite stone (the work of José Muñoz) and had two doors: the aforementioned Puerta Real de Sabatini, classic style with columns Doric and pediment, and a secondary, designed by Villanueva, opposite the Prado Museum, where access to the site currently (now Plaza de Murillo).

It also had stoves, nurseries and facilities for maintenance equipment and labor. In the eastern pavilion was erected greenhouses called Villanueva Pavilion, a singular work led by the royal architect, in whose construction outweighed aesthetic criteria that scientists, so that since the early nineteenth century was destined to host the library, herbarium and the classrooms needed for the departments of botany and agriculture.

The garden became the recipient of sending scientific expeditions hosted by the Crown in this period. Between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries participated in the development of at least five scientific expeditions, including stress the Botanical Expedition to New Granada (now Colombia), whose director was the famous José Celestino Mutis Botanical Expedition to the Viceroyalty of Peru botanists Hipólito Ruiz and José Antonio Pavón, the Botanical Expedition to New Spain (now Mexico), botanists and José Mariano Martin Sesse Mociño, Expedition around the World with botanists Alejandro Malaspina Antonio Pineda, Luis Née and Thaddeus Haenke, and the Commission Pacific Science, and in the nineteenth century, where the botanist Juan Isern participate.

The Garden received during this period drawings, seeds, fruits, wood, live plants and herbarium mainly, which helped increase its scientific collections and library.

The nineteenth century.

In the early nineteenth century botanical garden had become one of the most important botanical gardens in Europe, thanks mainly to the scientific collections housed and the work of its director, the botanist Antonio José Cavanilles, one of the most important botanical the history of Spanish science. Cavanilles reorganize the Garden, the Herbarium, the seed and give the center an international relevance. In addition to its scientific use, the garden used to be frequented during the spring and summer by high society and provided free to the public of medicinal plants. However, the War of Independence brought years of neglect the garden, which would last through the first third of the nineteenth century, despite the efforts of its director at the time Mariano Lagasca.

In 1857, with the garden director Mariano de la Paz Graells, zoologist and director of the Museum of Natural Sciences, are important reforms that still remain, such as cold stove that bears his name and the remodeling of the upper terrace. Also at that time installed a zoo, that twelve years later he moved to the Jardin del Buen Retiro (which became known as Wild Animal House).

However, in the early eighties of that century, the garden is crippled its surface. In 1882 two acres were segregated to construct the building currently occupied by the Ministry of Agriculture. In addition, in 1886 a cyclone in the area of Madrid caused terrible damage to the Royal Garden, causing the demolition of 564 trees of great valor.1 In 1893, he opened the street of the booksellers (popularly known as the slope of Claudio Moyano) losing one end of the main body of the garden, so that its surface is reduced to the current eight hectares.

The twentieth century

In 1939, the Royal Botanic Gardens becomes dependent on the Superior Council for Scientific Research. In 1942 he was declared Artistic Garden. However, following decades of hardship and neglect until it closed in 1974 to address deep restoration, which ended up giving it back its original style. Work was carried out between 1980 and 1981 we commissioned the architect Antonio Fernández Alba on the remodeling of the pavilion, and the architect Guillermo Sánchez Gil along with landscape architect Leandro Silva to return to its original layout gardens terraced levels.

Contains approximately 5,000 different species of trees and plants from around the world. In February 2005, the Royal Botanical Garden has expanded its exhibition space in 1 ha.