Greenhouses and Orangery of the Parc du Thabor

The name Thabor comes from the monks of Saint-Melaine abbey, who applied it in the seventeenth century to their gardens in reference to the mountain in Galilee. After the Revolution the City of Rennes became owner of the land on 10 May 1793. In 1866 and 1868 the landscape-gardening Bühler brothers were put in charge of laying out the park; Denis Bühler proposed creating the first landscaped garden in Rennes and moving the botanical garden to the east of the park, which happened in 1868.

The greenhouses and orangery are the work of the municipal architect Jean-Baptiste Martenot, who built them in 1862-1863 to replace older installations dating from 1807. They formed one element of this setting alongside the aviary, the gates and the bandstand.

On 11 July 1944 according to a local website devoted to the greenhouses, 17 July according to the Wikipedia article, an American bombing raid severely damaged the greenhouses, which were lost. The orangery buildings were restored and served as the base for new, more classical greenhouses by Georges Lefort. The park was later renovated between 2008 and 2018. The exact date of the post-war greenhouses is not given in the sources consulted.

Martenot's greenhouses consisted of three square pavilions with cut corners, called the palmerium, topped by balconies and then domes crowned with a lantern. Lower greenhouses forming galleries linked them. On either side stood two stone buildings with three glazed sides: the orangery proper, decorated with bas-reliefs and inscriptions honouring botanists such as Linnaeus and Jussieu.

Climate control relied on simple means. Rolling straw blinds shielded the plants from sun and excess heat; some panes of the glazing opened outwards on a projecting hinge, and the roof lanterns provided ventilation. The greenhouses rebuilt after 1944 are described, by contrast, as heavy reinforced-concrete structures with a more classical look that contrasts with the lightness of the original iron and glass. The west orangery, whose windows face every direction but north, offers about 85 m², now devoted to exhibitions.

Originally the hothouses held tropical plants as well as the seedlings and bulbs intended for the park's annual plantings, supplying fresh stock for the flowerbeds each year. The orangery sheltered potted trees in winter: orange, bergamot, mandarin and citron trees, according to the local greenhouse website.

The tropical collections have almost entirely disappeared, owing to budget constraints and health problems. What remains is mainly a cactus collection, housed in the west pavilion. The neighbouring botanical garden, created in 1868 on the east side of the park, holds more than 3,000 species planted along circular paths around eleven beds, in a layout inspired by the Candolle classification according to Wikipedia's page on the park.

The greenhouses and orangery stand in the Parc du Thabor in Rennes, which is free to enter. The orangery hosts temporary exhibitions of painting, photography, sculpture and mosaic, which can be seen according to the programme. Allow half an hour for the greenhouses and orangery, and more to walk the whole park.

The visit combines naturally with the botanical garden, created in 1868 on the east side, and with the two compositions the sources associate with the park: the French-style garden requested by the municipality and the landscaped garden proposed by Denis Bühler, the first of its kind in Rennes.