{"id":46426,"date":"2013-12-31T00:09:31","date_gmt":"2013-12-31T08:09:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/?p=46426"},"modified":"2013-12-31T00:09:31","modified_gmt":"2013-12-31T08:09:31","slug":"winter-gardens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.raisingjane.org\/journal\/46426","title":{"rendered":"Winter Gardens"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\tNeed a quick getaway to a warm, leafy refuge?<\/p>\n

Well, come along \u2026<\/p>\n

I just dug up a fun bit of history about winter gardens.<\/p>\n

Ever heard of such?<\/p>\n

I’m not referring to those lucky gals in southern locales whose pretty plots are all gussied up in green as we speak<\/i> (like, say, the folks in Winter Garden, Florida<\/a>).<\/p>\n

I can hardly even imagine.<\/p>\n

Nor am I talking roots ‘n tubers (even though you know I adore them).<\/p>\n

Historically speaking, winter gardens were large and wondrous conservatories that originated in Europe somewhere around the 17th century. It seems that the noblest of the noble would construct grandiose greenhouses, often attached to their palaces, like supernatural sunrooms, which housed tropical plants\u2014even towering trees!<\/p>\n

This, for example, is the little ol’ People’s Palace and Winter Gardens in Glasgow, Scotland:<\/p>\n

\"800px-Wfm_peoples_palace_back\"<\/a>

Photo by Finlay McWalter via Wikimedia Commons<\/p><\/div>\n

The earliest winter gardens were constructed of masonry and glass, but toward the 19th century, it became all-the-rage to utilize wrought iron and curvilinear glass. A breathtaking example of this type of architecture is the Curvilinear Range Botanic Gardens, built between 1843 and 1869, in Dublin, Ireland.<\/p>\n

Take a gander:<\/p>\n