A.V. Fomin Botanical Garden - History

History

Architect V.I. Beretti who as well known by his project of Kyiv University, was the first who raised issue of botanical garden establishment in 1834. He proposed to place the garden on the waste territory near the university buildings. For this purpose, from Kremenets Lyceum (Kiev) 513 plants were brought, that were temporarily placed in the Tsar (now City) garden. However, due to lack of funds the garden establishment was postponed for 5 years. Only in 1839 the Kiev school district administration gave permission for a temporary Botanical Garden start under the direction of Head of the Botany department of Kiev University Ernst Trautvetter, who then managed the Botanical Garden in the position of Director.
The official date of the Kiev Botanical Garden establishment is 22 May 1839, when E. Trautfetter started the first plantings. In 1841 the garden received its permanent status. In 1850 design and layout of the garden were completed. By 1852 there were 25,416 trees and 419 species of shrubs, as well as more than 4,000 species of other plants in the garden.

1941 - 1943 - during the Nazi occupation, many precious plants from the collection were lost. Some plants were transported to Germany. However, in spring of 1944 the garden was opened to the public, the restoration of greenhouses and plant collections started.

In 1960 the garden was declared an artifact of landscape art of the national importance.
In 1977 a greenhouse-climatron was built at the Garden, that was one of the largest in the world at that time.