Dr. Frederico Carlos Hoehne Greenhouses (São Paulo Botanical Garden)

The São Paulo Botanical Garden was founded in 1928 on the site it occupies today, at the initiative of the naturalist Frederico Carlos Hoehne, who had been invited to carry out a botanical project in the Água Funda district. The orchid house was created the same year and is often regarded as the garden's starting point; it was receiving visitors by 1929. The garden was open to the public from 1928, but was only made official in 1938.

The first works shaped two lakes and a garden inspired by part of the botanical garden of Uppsala in Sweden. It included an orchid house, two greenhouses with iron frames brought from England, two staircases and a reflecting pool. According to a historical study published in the Brazilian Journal of Botany, this initial infrastructure is associated with the firm Mario Whately & Co.

The greenhouses, conceived by Hoehne in 1928, were inaugurated in 1929. They now bear his name. Together with the orchid house they form the garden's oldest landmark. The sources consulted do not specify any restorations or heritage protection, so these points remain to be documented. Wikipedia reports that the Cerrado greenhouse is temporarily closed.

The two greenhouses are twins: each measures 26 metres long by 12 metres wide. Their frames are of iron, imported from England, which ties them to the tradition of nineteenth-century European metal glasshouses even though they date from the late 1920s. The sources consulted give neither the height, nor the type of glazing, nor the designer of the frame; these points are deliberately omitted.

Their setting, however, is documented. The greenhouses belong to the Linnaeus Garden (Jardim de Lineu), a formal, symmetrical composition in which they are combined with staircases, a water feature and the Palmeto, the space devoted to palms. This arrangement, inspired by a sector of the Uppsala botanical garden, makes the greenhouses the central element of a classically inspired garden rather than isolated buildings.

Each is assigned to a biome: one to the Atlantic Forest, the other to the Cerrado.

The two greenhouses illustrate the two biomes found in the State of São Paulo. One shows in a permanent exhibition plants drawn mainly from the Atlantic Forest. The other is devoted to the Cerrado. The sources consulted differ on the exact use of the second, which one describes as reserved for temporary exhibitions; the naming of each biome is therefore that given by Wikipedia.

Species lists and notable specimens do not appear in the documents read and are omitted.

The greenhouses complement, within the same garden, the orchid house founded in 1928, treated as a separate entry in this catalogue.

The greenhouses stand in the Linnaeus Garden, one of the oldest sections of the São Paulo Botanical Garden, inside the Fontes do Ipiranga State Park. They can be combined with a visit to the orchid house and the garden's paths, allowing two to three hours for the whole.

Since the Cerrado greenhouse is reported as temporarily closed, it is prudent to check the current situation with the garden before travelling. The garden, a place for walking, is explored on foot.