Jardin des Plantes

The botanical garden, with greenhouses and the natural history galleries

Area Latin Quarter
Type Park
Time needed 1h 30m

The Jardin des Plantes is the main botanical garden of Paris and the site of the Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, founded as the royal medicinal garden in 1635 and opened to the public in the following century. It fills a long rectangle in the 5th arrondissement between the rue Cuvier and the Seine, with a formal perspective of flowerbeds running down the middle and the museum galleries, the greenhouses and a small zoo arranged around the edges. The garden is free to walk into; the greenhouses and each of the natural history galleries are ticketed separately.

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Getting there

Gare d'Austerlitz, on Métro lines 5 and 10 and RER C, is at the north-east corner and about three minutes' walk; from Chatelet it is roughly ten minutes on line 5. Jussieu on lines 7 and 10 puts you at the north gate, and Censier-Daubenton on line 7 at the south-west corner near the Grande Galerie. The garden has several gates, so pick the one nearest whichever gallery you are going to rather than walking the full length twice.

What you see

From the Austerlitz end, the main alley runs between clipped plane trees and the formal beds, with the Jardin écologique and the rose and iris plantings off to one side. The Grandes Serres — the glass-and-iron greenhouses, the oldest of which date from the 1830s — hold the tropical rainforest, the arid-lands house and a room of fossil plants, and are the single best thing here on a cold day. At the far end, the Grande Galerie de l'Évolution is a vast nineteenth-century iron hall filled with a procession of mounted animals climbing the central floor, with whale skeletons overhead; the Galerie de Paléontologie et d'Anatomie comparée, nearer Austerlitz, is the one with the ranks of articulated skeletons and is unchanged in feel since 1898. Up the slope at the centre there is the alpine garden and the small labyrinth hill with a cast-iron gazebo at the top, and the Ménagerie, one of the oldest surviving zoos, occupies the river side.

What to pair it with

The Grand Mosque of Paris is across the road from the south-west gate, and the Institut du monde arabe is ten minutes downriver. The Arènes de Lutèce and the rue Mouffetard market street are both a short walk uphill into the Latin Quarter.

When to go

Weekday mornings in the galleries, before the school groups arrive, are much the calmest. Spring brings the iris and peony beds and the cherry trees; the greenhouses are at their best in winter when there is a reason to be indoors. The garden itself is open daily from early until dusk and stays pleasant in late afternoon, while the galleries close earlier and at least one of them is normally shut one day a week.

What is hard about it

The main cost trap is assuming one ticket covers everything: the Grande Galerie, the palaeontology gallery, the greenhouses and the Ménagerie are each paid separately, and buying all of them for a family adds up quickly. The Grande Galerie gets very loud with school parties and its labelling is thin in English. The palaeontology gallery is magnificent but deliberately old-fashioned, dusty and poorly lit, and some visitors find it depressing rather than atmospheric. The Ménagerie is cramped by modern zoo standards. The garden is also flat, exposed and fairly plain out of season.

Common questions

How long do you need at the Jardin des Plantes?

About 90 minutes for the garden plus one gallery or the greenhouses. Doing the garden, the greenhouses and two galleries properly is most of a day.

Is the Jardin des Plantes free?

The garden and its alleys are free to walk around. The greenhouses, the Grande Galerie de l'Évolution, the palaeontology gallery and the Ménagerie each need their own ticket.

Which gallery is best with children?

The Grande Galerie de l'Évolution, for the animal parade and the whale skeletons. Older children tend to prefer the skeleton ranks in the palaeontology gallery.