Greenhouses of the Orto Botanico di Roma (Serra Monumentale and Serra Corsini)

The Orto Botanico of Rome took its present form in 1883, after Italian unification, in the former park of Villa Corsini on the slopes of the Janiculum. Pietro Romualdo Pirotta was its first modern director. The land had belonged to Palazzo Riario, later Palazzo Corsini, where Queen Christina of Sweden lived from 1659 to 1689; two pools from that period survive today inside the Serra Corsini.

The Serra Monumentale is the garden's original greenhouse: it was built in 1877 by the Lyon firm Mathian. Several popular guides add that it was made for the botanical garden when the latter stood on via Milano, and was dismantled and re-erected on the new site after the move to the Corsini park; this point was not found in the official page consulted. The same guides credit Mathian with the Serra Francese, built in 1883-1884.

The Serra Corsini dates from the nineteenth century (one source gives 1800) and is presented as the first heated greenhouse laid out in the garden. The historic structures suffered damage during the Second World War and were later restored.

A new Serra della Biodiversità Tropicale, behind the Fountain of the Tritons, was inaugurated on 18 June 2026 to study, among other things, the role of tropical plants in mitigating air pollution.

The Serra Monumentale is the garden's showpiece. Built by the Lyon firm Mathian in 1877, it is described by several guides as a structure of glass and cast iron, an advanced technique for its time. The official page states that it is flanked on both sides by two gabled greenhouses.

The Serra Francese, attributed to the same firm and dated 1883-1884, is described as a curved structure of wrought iron and glass, with arched ribs and partly overlapping panes; this comes only from secondary guides.

The Serra Corsini, older and different in character, is the garden's first heated greenhouse; it contains two historic pools from the time of Queen Christina of Sweden.

The modern tropical house keeps humidity at 80% and temperatures of 18 to 20 °C in winter and around 30 °C in summer. In all, the garden has about 2,000 m² of greenhouses within a 12-hectare site.

The Serra Monumentale is devoted to euphorbias (Euphorbia abyssinica, E. grandicornis, E. tirucalli, E. mauritanica), joined by two climbers, Quisqualis indica and Petrea volubilis. The two gabled houses that flank it shelter, among others, orchids (Cattleya, Vanilla, Laelia, Dendrobium, Epidendrum, Aerangis, Angraecum) and bromeliads (Tillandsia, Vriesea, Aechmea, Cryptanthus, Dyckia, Guzmania).

The Serra Corsini gathers succulents, chiefly Cactaceae, Agavaceae, Euphorbiaceae and Crassulaceae, with caudiciform plants of the genera Fockea and Pachypodium.

The tropical house is organised by theme: tropical understorey, Pandanus, marsh plants, useful plants, rainforest and palms; it shows Phytelephas macrocarpa, Aristolochia gigantea, Hibiscus schizopetalus and epiphytes including Nepenthes. The garden as a whole holds more than 3,000 species.

The greenhouses stand in La Sapienza's Orto Botanico, entered from Largo Cristina di Svezia, between via della Lungara and the slopes of the Janiculum, in Trastevere. The garden covers 12 hectares: a full visit to the greenhouses and the paths takes about two hours.

The Serra Monumentale, the Serra Corsini and the tropical house can be seen in a single loop, with the new Tropical Biodiversity Greenhouse, inaugurated in June 2026, completing the circuit. The garden also has a bamboo collection, a rose garden and a Japanese garden; spring bloom is a good time to come. The outing can be extended to the neighbouring Palazzo Corsini and the Janiculum slopes.