Botanic Garden

This alpine botanic garden was set up in 1906 by Marie-Louise Cognac-Jaÿ who founded La Samaritaine department store in Paris. It is an exceptional garden

The garden has bee carved out of the south-facing side of the mountains overlooking the village. La Jaÿsinia covers an area of 3.7 hectares on steeply-sloping terrain (80 metres' difference in altitude between the top and bottom of the garden). It is home to 5,000 varieties of alpine flowers from all five continents. Since 1936, it has been run by the Scientific Division of the Natural History Museum in Paris (Botanic Gardens and Wildlife Parks department) and it has a laboratory where wide-ranging research is carried out. Features of the garden include fountains and cascades, landscaped trees, the ruins of the 12th-century Tornalta Castle, an 18th-century chapel and 8,000 plants from all over the world. As a little corner of nature in the heart of heritage buildings, La Jaÿsinia in the village of Samoëns in Haute-Savoie is something of an exception. It is the only botanic garden of its kind in the Alps, containing no less than 5,000 varieties of mountain flowers. It is both a place of study and a haven of tranquillity where people come to recover from stressful everyday lives. It is also a "must" for anybody spending some time in Samoëns.
A little bit of history
On 1st July 1838, a little girl called Marie-Louise Jaÿ was born in Samoëns. She was destined to leave her mark on the village - and Paris! At the age of 15, the young girl set off to try her luck in Paris where she met and married Ernest Cognacq. Together, they founded ?La Samaritaine?, one of the capital's largest department stores. It was an immediate success.
Marie-Louise and Ernest, who were childless, found themselves with a huge fortune and they spent the end of their life giving to worthy causes. They never forgot the village where Marie-Louise was born.
One hundred years ago, in 1906, she created the Jaÿsinia botanic garden.
It is much more than a mark of her love of her village. La Jaÿsinia is a unique place carved out of the southern slopes of the mountain overlooking the village of Samoëns.

A walk in this south-facing garden is as bucolic as they come. The narrow path winding its way up the mountainside passes waterfalls and fountains before reaching the ruins of the 12th-centuy Tornalta Castle and a 13th-century chapel. The higher you go, the more panoramic the view of the small town below. This is a walk worthy of the finest paintings by Romantic landscape artists.
And in addition to the magnificent panoramic view, there are thousands of different plants and flowers to delight the senses.