Jardin Alpin

The Jardin Alpin is tucked away in a quiet corner of the Jardin des Plantes, but you might walk right past its entrance without ever realizing it is there. To reach this specialized garden, you must find a small, inconspicuous underground tunnel that leads you beneath the park grounds. This tunnel was designed specifically to transport you into a recessed valley, nearly ten feet below the surrounding landscape. By sinking the garden into this natural depression, the botanists who created it in the nineteen thirties successfully engineered a protected microclimate that shields delicate high-altitude plants from the harsh Parisian heat and wind.