Guides Corner

CONSERVATORY HISTORY

• The Conservatory of Flowers is a living museum of rare and beautiful tropical plants under glass. From Borneo to Bolivia, the 1500 species of plants at the Conservatory represent unusual flora from more than 50 countries around the world. It houses an increasingly important collection of rare and endangered plant species, including orchids, palms and aroids.
• It is also home to an unparalleled collection of high-altitude pleurothallid orchids -- more than 700 of the 1,000 known species. It is the largest and most comprehensive public collection in the world.
• Opened in 1879, the wood and glass greenhouse is the oldest existing Conservatory in North America.
• It is designated as a city, state and national historic landmark and was one of the 100 most endangered sites of the World Monuments Fund. It is a civil engineering landmark as well, serving as one of the few examples of a Victorian-era prefabricated building.
• One of the Conservatory's roles in the community and visitors' lives is to reach the most people with the message of conservation and stewardship of the natural world. Through environmental experience, the mind begins to open to new ideas about how surroundings are viewed and the important role they play in everyday life, merging experience with education.

• A severe windstorm with gusts to 100 mph caused damage to the west wing and dome of the Conservatory in December of 1995. Many panes of glass were broken and the southeast corner of the dome was blown apart. The dome itself became unstable after the storm and required cross cabling to prevent it from collapsing.
• During one of the earlier renovations, the side vents were removed and replaced with concrete panels. Removing the side vents impaired the natural cooling of the greenhouse, while simultaneously increasing the relative humidity inside. The end result was accelerated deterioration of the structural wood. In another renovation, the copper flashing used to provide a protective water seal over the three laminated layers of the arches was removed and not replaced. Again, this situation provided yet another means for water to slowly deteriorate the structural wood. The storm damage, in conjunction with the deterioration of the structure, made it unsafe for the public, forcing its closure from December 1995 through September 2003.
• Since there were no documents to help guide the renovation, a part of the Conservatory was disassembled piece by piece to determine how it was originally constructed, which wood species were used and how to rehabilitate it using current day technology.
• The structure was originally constructed of douglas fir, sugar pine and redwood. The original Conservatory was constructed of 80% old-growth redwood; the new Conservatory is nearly 100% sustainably harvested old-growth redwood.
• No living redwoods were destroyed for the purposes of this project. The wood was retrieved from "buckskin" logs, trees which fell naturally, standing stumps, or commercially felled trees that could not be retrieved economically.
• Other aspects of this phase included replacing 40% of the mullions (vertical members which hold the glass panes in place), creating new footings and arches, installing safety glass and restoring the side vents.
• Next, the east wing and central dome were rebuilt. Plants housed in the dome during the rebuilding of the west wing were moved into greenhouses behind the Conservatory or back into the west wing. One plant remained in the dome during the entire process: the signature 100 year-old philodendron, which was protected by a custom-built, cylindrical greenhouse during construction.
• The upper dome itself was completely rebuilt on the ground, before being hoisted into place by a 100-foot crane. This was a dramatically different approach from that used in the building's original 1878 construction and the restorations after the 1883 and 1918 fires. The current approach allowed the construction team to complete both the upper and lower domes simultaneously - accelerating construction time.

• The Conservatory uses a number of criteria to determine which plants are included it its current plantings. These criteria include: dramatic effect from flowers, leaves, fragrance, color, texture, pollination mechanism, morphological adaptation, rarity, economic importance, health or uniqueness. Duplicates beyond a set maximum quantity and species that are deemed unusable are traded for desirable plants.
• Perhaps the greatest percentage of plants come from commercial sources. The truly unusual and bizarre species come from other botanical gardens; Their staff botanists and horticulturalists are always eager to trade plants. Many local, national and international plant societies are also sources for unusual plants as well as for cultural information.