This photograph from around 1900 shows a little girl (probably the daughter of the Professor of Botany) sitting on the leaf of Victoria amazonica, the world's largest water lily, in the recently opened Victoria greenhouse.

At the Rheinsprung

1589  Foundation by Caspar Bauhin, therefore one of the oldest Botanical Gardens in the World

At the Spalengraben

1692  Relocation to the Prediger church (today University Hospital Klinikum 2, Petersgraben 6)
1776  Werner de Lachenal, Professor for Anatomy and Botany (until 1798)
1777  Lachenal founds a new building for professors and gardeners
1795  New greenhouse and private garden
1800  Lachenal dies. K. F. Hagenbach is the successor
1837  First printed Index seminum with over 600 species

In front of the Aeschentor

1838/40  Relocation to the Aeschentor. Wooden greenhouses
1844  Glass houses for orchids and ferns
1862  Staff increase, 1 fully employed gardener
1863  new metal greenhouses; Victoria regia flowers
1870  Bust from W. de Lachenal sponsored by the Peter Merian foundation
1891  first thematic event: pumpkin exhibition
1892  small cactus exibition

At the Spalentor

1898  Relocation to the Spalentor (in former times the Spalengottesacker, cenetery, opening on 12.–14. Juli)
1949  Sabal umbraculifera reaches the roof of the tropical greenhouse and is felled
1962  new plant breeding greenhouses
1967  new tropical greenhouse
1978  Gesneriaceae exhibition
1989  400th anniversary • events & exhibitions • publications
1990  every year public events and tours
1996  reconstruction of the Victoria house, new cold house and succulent house
2011  flowering Amorphophallus titanum; 25'000 visitors
2012  flowering Amorphophallus titanum; 14'000 visitors
2022  new main entrance by the Spalentor
2023  new tropcial greenhouse with cloud forest greenhouse