Lalbagh Glass House

Lalbagh, commissioned by Hyder Ali in 1760 and completed by Tipu Sultan, became the Government Botanical Garden in August 1856. On Kew's recommendation William New arrived in 1858, and John Cameron, also Kew-trained, took charge in March 1874. Under him the garden grew from 45 acres in 1874 to 188 after additions in 1889, 1891 and 1894, and plant introductions multiplied: the Deccan Herald notes 2,020 species at the second census and 3,222 eleven years later.

The conservatory was Cameron's idea: he wanted a building for acclimatising plants and for flower shows, which had until then been held near the bandstand. At a reception given by Maharaja Chamaraja Wodeyar, Prince Albert Victor, eldest son of the Prince of Wales, then touring India, laid the foundation stone of the Albert Victor Conservatory on 30 November 1889. The glasshouse and bandstand were built in 1890-91.

Cameron handed over to G. H. Krumbiegel in January 1908. In 1935 the conservatory was extended, this time with steel from the Mysore Iron and Steel Company at Bhadravathi. Now known as the Glass House, it remains the setting for the flower shows: the Deccan Herald reported the 218th in August 2025 and the 220th in August 2026.

The conservatory follows the model of London's Crystal Palace: a light metal frame carrying broad expanses of glass. Its pillars were cast in Glasgow by Walter Macfarlane and Company, and the city's Saracen Foundry is also named as the source of the iron. The 1935 extension, in steel made at Bhadravathi by the Mysore Iron and Steel Company, marks a shift from material imported from Britain to local production.

From the outset the building was meant for two uses, acclimatising plants and staging shows, and its open interior now takes monumental displays. In August 2026 a floral replica of the Begur temple, 50 feet long, 24 feet wide and 26 feet high, stood at its centre. A 2023 Deccan Herald retrospective describes the conservatory as an ornament whose beauty no other public garden in India could match. It stands at the end of the broad avenue from the north gate, the garden's main entrance, with the circular dovecote of 1893 to the south.

Built to acclimatise the plants introduced by Cameron and his successors, the Glass House now serves mainly as the stage for the flower shows run by the Karnataka Horticulture Department in the weeks of Republic Day (January) and Independence Day (August). Each edition follows a historical or cultural theme. In August 2022, a show dedicated to the actors Rajkumar and Puneeth Rajkumar used 3.5 lakh stems of roses and chrysanthemums to recreate the Gajanur house. In 2025 a replica of Kittur Fort filled the conservatory, in a show using more than 36 lakh flowers of 105 varieties.

In 2026 the Ganga dynasty theme gathered more than 3.05 lakh chrysanthemums and roses around the Begur temple replica, replaced during the show for a total of over 6.1 lakh flowers in ten days, along with some 25,000 ornamental foliage plants; the lawns in front of the Glass House held more than 2.75 lakh plants, among them orchids, anthuriums, bromeliads and bougainvillea.

The Glass House is reached from the north gate, whose avenue leads straight to it. Outside show time the cast-iron architecture can be appreciated at leisure; during the January and August shows (the August ones run for about ten days), crowds are very large: 8.34 lakh visitors from 5 to 15 August 2022 according to the New Indian Express, and more than 10 lakh expected in 2025. A visit can continue to the 1893 dovecote, the Royal Palm Avenue, the lake and Lalbagh Rock, a gneiss formation some 3,000 million years old crowned by a Kempe Gowda tower.