Bordighera: Exotic garden Pallanca [Video & photo gallery]

The land area on which the Pallanca Exotic Garden develops was purchased by Bartolomeo Pallanca (1884) in the early years of last century when, having abandoned the collaboration with the German botanist and gardener Ludwig Winter, he decided to start his own business in cultivation and trade of exotic and succulent plants. Parallel to the commercial activity of Bartolomeo, and after him his son Giacomo (1910), they dedicated themselves to the collection and classification of the rarest specimens by placing them on the sandstone slopes of the old extinct volcano. Over the years what would become the Pallanca Exotic Garden was enriched with specimens of considerable size and rarity out of commerce. The grandeur and completeness of the collection spured on, and still urges, the major botanical gardens of Europe (Frankfurt, Zurich, London, Gent, Hamburg) to request specimens for study and classification; specimens otherwise not available on our continent.

In 1952 the exhibition of some specimens of the Pallanca collection was awarded the Turin Grand Prix of Honor by the Council of Ministers. A year later the State Minister for Forestry and Agriculture awarded Bartolomeo Pallanca the Diploma of Merit. In the same year, the collection of cactuses from the Pallanca Garden obtained the Gold Medal at the Bern International Exhibition. In 1954, Floricoltura Pallanca obtained the Gold Medal at the VII National Floriculture Exhibition. In 1958 the Pallanca collection was awarded by the Société d’Horticulture de Liége with the Diploma of Honor by Acclamation. In the same year Giacomo Pallanca was appointed honorary member of the National Geographic Society. In 1960 the arrangement of exotic plants of the Pallanca collection was awarded in Gent by the Prix de la Société Royale d'Agricolture et de Botanique at the Floralies Gantoises where it received the Commendation of King Baldwin. In 1961, at the International Flower of the World Exhibition, the specimens of cactuses from the Pallanca collection were awarded the Diploma of Honor of the President of the Council of Ministers. In 1969 at the Chelsea Flowers Show the landscaping of exotic and succulent plants produced by the Pallanca Garden is praised and rewarded with an exhibition at the Royal Palace of Windsor. In 1973, at the request of the municipality of Barcelona, ​​part of the specimens of the collection preserved in the Garden was sold for the establishment of the exotic sector of the Montjuich park.

In all these years the Garden has become a must for researchers from all the universities of Europe, as well as for fans of the entire peninsula. In the face of this interest, since 1989 Barth, son of Giacomo, has decided to order the Garden taxonomically and architecturally to allow it to be visited. In connection with this, the Pallanca Exotic Garden has become part of the list of Museums and Cultural, Environmental and Landscape Interest Sites of our peninsula.

Via Madonna della Ruota, 1 - Bordighera (IM)

giardino@pallanca.it - ​​+39 0184 266347 - +39 328 3273151