A BUTTERFLY house proposed for Bournemouth’s former Imax site would be a "tropical paradise" and no taller than the funfair which is there at the moment.

That is the claim of Luke Brown, one of the partners behind the plan, who says it would be a spectacular all-weather attraction for the resort.

Mr Brown, director of the Butterfly Gardener Ltd, is behind the seasonal butterfly house which has kept returning to London’s Natural History Museum over the past 10 years. He is proposing the Bournemouth plan alongside Clive Farrell, who runs Stratford-upon-Avon Butterfly Farm and Florida’s Butterfly World.

Mr Brown has been interested in the site for 10 years but Bournemouth council has so far ruled out the scheme, citing public opinion about keeping the view from Bath Hill.

But Mr Brown said the scheme would not block any views across the Imax site, which is currently home to funfair rides.

“We’re looking at something about the height of the carousel that’s there at the moment and certainly not as tall as the helter skelter,” he said.

“We’re looking at using domes, which are aesthetically pleasing anyway. We’re not looking at a commercial greenhouse or polytunnels.”

He said visitors to the attraction would be “walking into a tropical paradise packed with thousands of plants from around the world, from palm trees to beautiful flowers”, full of birds, insects and butterflies.

“Anyone that’s got any doubts or doesn’t have experience of this kind of site, I’d challenge them to visit the best in the country. Stratford is the flagship butterfly house in the UK,” he said.

The business partners say they will spend £1million on the butterfly house but will want the site ona 25-year lease.

“It will bring considerable money for the council and it will be one of the few all-weather attractions in Bournemouth,” said Mr Brown.

Mr Brown has been a butterfly enthusiast since he was 10 years old and visited the London butterfly farm at Syon House, which Mr Farrell set up with Dame Miriam Rothschild.

“I wrote to Father Christmas and asked for a greenhouse and got my first little plastic greenhouse at the age of 10,” he said.

He said the seafront site was the best he had seen for a butterfly house.

“We’ve looked at other sites but because we’ve been talking about this for 10 years, it seems silly to let it go now,” he said.

“I would set it up with Clive and run it for at least three years just to make sure it was absolutely as I wanted it,” said Mr Brown, who is based in Wiltshire.

“It’s not something I would want to leave with somebody else very quickly. Potentially I’d relocate to Bournemouth.”