Ansan Botanical Garden Glasshouses (안산식물원)

Ansan Botanical Garden is a municipal project. The city laid it out in 1999 in Seongho Park, in the Sangnok district, to give residents a place to learn about nature and ecosystems, and its first building, a tropical exhibition hall, opened that year.

Two further halls followed in 2002, one for the plants of central Korea and one for those of the south. Between 2004 and 2007 several rounds of work reshaped the landscaping and outdoor facilities, according to the Digital Ansan Culture Encyclopedia.

In March 2012 the Gyeonggi provincial news portal ran a feature on the garden, headlined as a haven of wild flowers inside pyramid-shaped glasshouses. It reported that the city had spent 2.6 billion won creating and running the site, which opens all year round and receives about 200,000 visitors annually. None of the sources consulted names the architect or the firm that built the glasshouses.

The site covers 16,363 m². Its three glazed exhibition halls add up to 2,084 m²; a 182.9 m² management building stands alongside, and 14,096 m² are given over to landscaping, ponds, small squares and parking.

Each hall represents a different setting: the first is tropical, the second presents the flora of central Korea and the third that of the south. The provincial portal describes them as pyramid-shaped glasshouses.

The way the collections are shown points to different climate regimes: at the end of winter the central hall displayed plants still dormant and waiting for spring, while the tropical hall shows palms and cacti. The sources consulted give neither the height of the houses, nor the material of their frames, nor details of their technical equipment.

The tropical hall holds about 3,000 plants; the 2012 provincial article put the figure at 220 species, mostly palms, flowering plants and cacti.

The central hall contains some 18,000 plants, including a rare yew from Mount Seorak (설악산눈주목). The southern hall has around 16,000 plants in five groups and 178 species: wetland plants, lotus, edible plants, water lilies and fragrant trees.

Outside, five kinds of pine and 45 species in all, amounting to 58,000 plants, frame the glasshouses, and lotus flowers in the ponds. Altogether the three halls display roughly 30,000 plants.

The garden lies in Seongho Park, in Ansan's Sangnok district, at 113 Seongho-ro. An hour is enough to walk through the three glasshouses and around the ponds.

The tropical hall makes a warm refuge in winter, while summer brings the lotus season in the outdoor ponds and the southern hall. OpenStreetMap places the Seongho Memorial Hall (성호기념관) and the tomb of Yi Ik (이익선생묘) a few steps away on the edge of the park, which makes it easy to extend the walk.