Higashiyama Zoo and Botanical Garden

photo by 円周率３パーセント · CC BY-SA 4.0

photo by 円周率３パーセント (Enshuritsu 3 percent) · CC BY-SA 4.0

The 1936 greenhouse is the oldest public greenhouse in Japan, a cultural property since 2006.

The botanical garden opens with a steel-and-glass pavilion from 1936: it is the oldest surviving public greenhouse in Japan, and since 2006 the state has protected it as an Important Cultural Property. Once inside, you walk under the palms of the central hall, reassembled in the restoration completed in 2020. About four hundred and fifty animal species live in the surrounding sixty hectares.

Higashiyama is both a zoo and a botanical garden, sixty hectares on the hills east of the city, in Chikusa Ward. The front pavilion of the greenhouse was built in 1936. The citation for its protection describes it as one of the country's first true steel greenhouses and one of the first fully welded Japanese buildings, that is, a piece of the history of building technology as well as of architecture. From 2013 to 2020 it was dismantled and restored, and it reopened in April 2021. About seven thousand plant species grow in the park; on the ridge, the Sky Tower, from 1989, is 134 metres tall.

ℹ️ Open 9:00–16:50, last entry and last ticket sales at 16:30. Closed on Mondays, and if the Monday is a public holiday it closes on the next day that is not a holiday; also closed from 29 December to 1 January. The adult ticket costs 500 yen until 30 September 2026 and 800 yen from 1 October 2026, when the other prices change too: the combined ticket with the Sky Tower goes from 640 to 880 yen, Nagoya residents over 65 from 100 to 200 yen, the annual pass from 2,000 to 3,200 yen. Entry is free up to junior high, before and after the change. A ticket bought by 30 September is still valid afterwards, without paying the difference. If you show a public transport day ticket valid that day, you get a discount. On the days of the autumn illumination the botanical garden stays open until 20:30, while the zoo section still closes at 16:50; the Sky Tower closes at 21:30, many hours after the park. Sixty hectares of ups and downs: walking shoes, and three hours is the minimum for the zoo alone.

🚉 Hoshigaoka · 14 min walk

Sources: www2.higashiyama.city.nagoya.jp · higashiyama.city.nagoya.jp · higashiyama.city.nagoya.jp · higashiyama.city.nagoya.jp

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