Boston Flora

Tag: Victorian Gardens

  • Thursdays, October 8 – December 10, 6:00 pm – 7:30 pm GMT (but recorded) – Gardens of Empire: Espionage, Exploration & Exotic Plants, Online

    The Victorian age transformed Britain’s gardens more profoundly than any previous period. Advances in science and technology, expanding global trade, imperial ambition and the rise of the middle classes combined to create an unprecedented enthusiasm for gardening, introducing thousands of new plants and reshaping both public and private landscapes.

    This ten-week course explores the remarkable stories behind this horticultural revolution. Through the lives of pioneering botanists, adventurous plant hunters, gardeners, engineers and influential patrons, we will discover how exploration, scientific discovery and empire shaped the gardens of nineteenth-century Britain.

    From hazardous collecting expeditions in the Himalayas and Robert Fortune’s clandestine mission into China to Joseph Paxton’s revolutionary glasshouses and the spectacular bedding schemes that became a hallmark of Victorian taste, the course examines the close relationship between horticulture, science, commerce and society. Alongside figures such as Joseph Dalton Hooker, Charles Darwin and Marian North, we will also consider the contributions of influential women, professional gardeners and the great nursery firms that helped fuel Britain’s passion for plants.

    Topics include the creation of public parks, the rise of kitchen gardens and conservatories, the fascination with orchids and ferns, and the enduring appeal of celebrated gardens such as Kew, Biddulph Grange and Cragside. We will also examine the more challenging aspects of this history, including the relationship between botanical collecting, colonial expansion, indigenous knowledge and environmental change.

    Suitable for gardeners, historians and anyone with an interest in the history of gardens, art and horticulture, the course assumes no specialist knowledge. It welcomes all who wish to explore the cultural, scientific and social significance of Victorian gardening and discover how this extraordinary period continues to influence the gardens we enjoy today.

    10 WEEK ONLINE COURSE

    PRICE £250.00. Register at www.thegardenhistorians.co.uk

    The online Garden Historians Zoom course will begin on Thursday, 8th October 2026. 6 pm-7.30 pm GMT. All Zoom sessions are recorded and notes are sent out after each class.

  • Thursday, September 29, 5:00 am – The 19th Century Garden – The Wild Garden: William Robinson and Alfred Parsons, Online

    The Gardens Trust six part series of lectures on the Victorian Garden continues on September 29 with an online talk by Caroline Ikin on The Wild Garden: William Robinson and Alfred Parsons. The gardener and journalist William Robinson gave voice to the movement towards informality in gardens in the second half of the nineteenth century, promoting the embellishment of woodland to add interest and color, and the creation of naturalized wildflower meadows. His advice was underpinned by the principle of positioning plants in situations where they would naturally flourish. The idea of wild gardening was not concerned with a return to nature; although endorsing the use of wildflowers, Robinson also promoted the introduction of hardy exotics. Art still triumphed over nature in the wild garden, as exemplified in Robinson’s manifesto The Wild Garden, first published in 1870. Subsequent editions included nearly a hundred illustrations by Alfred Parsons, an artist and garden designer, many of them depicting plants from Robinson’s own garden at Gravetye in Sussex. This lecture will assess the impact of Robinson’s and Parson’s contribution to garden theory, through an examination of their writing, art and garden design.

    Dr Caroline Ikin is a Curator at the National Trust, with a portfolio including the gardens at Standen and Nymans. She has previously worked for the Gardens Trust and is a writer specializing in nineteenth century art, architecture and gardens. Caroline is author of The Victorian Garden (Bloomsbury, 2012), The Victorian Gardener (Bloomsbury, 2014) and The Kitchen Garden (Amberley, 2017), and regularly contributes book and exhibition reviews to various publications. Her PhD thesis examined the designed landscape created by John Ruskin at Brantwood. £5 each or all 6 for £30. Register on Eventbrite HERE.

  • Thursday, June 2, 5:00 am – The Nineteenth Century Garden: Great British Parks, Online

    This Gardens Trust talk on June 2 is the last in the Gardens Trust’s 2nd series on Victorian Gardens on Thursdays @ 10.00 GMT. £5. Attendees will be sent a Zoom link 2 days prior to the start of the talk, and again a few hours before the talk. A link to the recorded session (available for 1 week) will be sent shortly afterwards. Register through Eventbrite HERE

    This really is a fascinating insight into the history of one of the greatest ever institutions – the great British public park. Many have enjoyed them at some time in our lives but what do we really know about them? their origins? did they really start in the Victorian period, or do they go even further back? This talk illustrates their origins, talks about the need for parks, the Victorian heyday, what makes a great park, with examples of lodges, lakes, bandstands, fountains and floral displays, to their great decline in the sixties and seventies. However, the subsequent revival has led to a major shift in interest in our parks and once again we are much in love with them. This is also a highly illustrative talk accompanied by slides with examples of parks from across the UK and their designs and architecture.

    Lecturer Paul Rabbitts MLA MPMA FRHistS FRSA FLI is a graduate of Sheffield City Polytechnic with a degree in Geography, followed by a master’s degree in Landscape Architecture at Edinburgh University. He has worked extensively across the UK, from Jersey, to Carlisle City Council, Middlesbrough Council, Halcrow Group, with 11 years as Head of Parks, Heritage and Culture at Watford Borough Council. Paul moved in Jan 2022 to take up a post as the Head of Parks and Open Spaces at the new City of Southend-on-Sea. He is a published author of over 28 books on the subject of parks, local history as well as icons such as Decimus Burton, Grinling Gibbons and Sir Christopher Wren. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, the Royal Historical Society and The Landscape Institute, he lectures frequently on the subject of public parks and the historic icon of parks – the bandstand.

  • Thursday, May 19, 5:00 am – The Nineteenth Century Garden: Joseph Paxton, Online

    This Gardens Trust talk on May 19 is the third in the Gardens Trust’s 2nd series on Victorian Gardens on Thursdays @ 10.00 GMT. £5 each or all 6 for £30. Attendees will be sent a Zoom link 2 days prior to the start of the talk, and again a few hours before the talk. A link to the recorded session (available for 1 week) will be sent shortly afterwards. Register through Eventbrite HERE

    Sir Joseph Paxton (1803-1865) is remembered for designing large-scale public works, including parks, cemeteries and buildings, most notably the Crystal Palace. These sites were intended to be used and enjoyed by everybody, but Paxton’s inspiration came from the more exclusive environment of the country house. Among his achievements at Chatsworth, where he was employed as head gardener to the 6th Duke of Devonshire, he created one of the tallest water fountains in the world, brought the Victoria Regia (Amazonica) water lily to flower, and built an enormous glasshouse called the Great Stove. These Chatsworth projects were not only horticultural, engineering or aesthetic endeavours. Paxton was also driven by a belief in the moralising influence of gardens and gardening. With the agreement of his employer and the support of his wife Sarah, he opened Chatsworth’s gates to tens of thousands of tourists every year. As his success increased, so did his reach – the Crystal Palace and its gardens were visited by millions. This talk will draw on correspondence from the Devonshire Collections archive to shed light on how Joseph Paxton understood the social impact of his work, as it grew in scale and traversed the boundaries of private and public.

    Lecturer Dr Lauren Batt recently completed a PhD with the University of Sheffield in collaboration with the Collections Department at Chatsworth. Her thesis examined power and authority on the Chatsworth Estate between 1811 and 1877, focusing in particular on servants and estate workers. She subsequently worked with the image and ephemera collection at Derby Museums, in preparation for the opening of the Museum of Making, and as a Project Curator for the National Trust at Hardwick Hall. Lauren now works in the Curatorial Department at Welbeck Abbey in Nottinghamshire, and continues to research topics including historic graffiti, domestic service and model architecture on nineteenth-century country estates. At home, she is an enthusiastic but woefully inept gardener.

  • Thursday, April 28, 5:00 am – Victorian Gardens: Trees in Towns & Cities, Victorian Urban Arboriculture, Online

    This Gardens Trust talk on April 28 is the first in our 2nd series on Victorian Gardens on Thurs @ 10.00 GMT (5 am Eastern) from 28 April. £5 each or all 6 for £30. Register through Eventbrite HERE. Attendees will be sent a Zoom link 2 days prior to the start of the talk, and again a few hours before the talk. A link to the recorded session (available for 1 week) will be sent shortly afterwards.

    On April 28 Mark Johnston will speak on Trees in Towns & Cities, Victorian Urban Arboriculture. Throughout the nineteenth century and particularly during Victorian times, trees became an increasing feature in Britain’s towns and cities. In this talk the focus is on those trees that were planted and maintained in a variety of urban settings. This includes trees in private residential gardens and squares, those in public parks and arboretums, alongside streets, in cemeteries and in therapeutic landscapes. The nineteenth century witnessed huge advances in the development of British arboriculture that laid the foundations for today’s arboricultural industry. This was particularly evident in development of new machinery, equipment and techniques. Much of this was prompted by the challenges of integrating large trees into the urban environment in close proximity to people, buildings and roads. After centuries of being regarded as synonymous with forestry or considered a branch of horticulture, arboriculture emerged in the late nineteenth century as a separate discipline.

    Dr Mark Johnston is an independent scholar who holds a PhD in urban forestry from the University of Ulster. He has nearly fifty years’ experience in the greenspace industry, including working as a tree surgery contractor, tree officer in local government, consultant in private practice, government adviser and university academic. Mark was the Lead Researcher and main author of the government report entitled Trees in Towns II published in 2008. For fifteen years he was Research Fellow at Myerscough College and Course Leader for its MSc Arboriculture and Urban Forestry. Since his official retirement Mark’s research has focused on the historical aspects of arboriculture and he has published three books on this subject. His contribution to trees and the urban environment has been widely acknowledged with several prestigious national and international awards.

  • Wednesdays, June 16 – July 21, 10:00 am – Great Newport Landscapes, 1840 – 1940

    The Preservation Society of Newport County and Rhode Island School of Design Continuing Education present a six-week landscape course, led by John R. Tschirch, Architectural Historian of the Preservation Society, beginning June 16 through July 21.  Each session will begin at 10:00 am at 424 Bellevue Avenue in Newport.

    This course will examine the landmark landscapes of Newport, created during the 19th and early 20th centuries, when the city was one of the most fashionable summer resorts in the nation. Known as the “Eden of America,” Newport and its environs have a rich garden design and horticultural heritage. Lectures and site visits will consider Newport landscapes by leading figures in American design and planning, horticulture, the history of plant and tree collection and propagation, species identification, garden architecture and sculpture, preservation practices, and stylistic elements of Victorian and Gilded Age period landscapes.

    June 16: The Picturesque 19th Century Landscape in Newport
    June 23: Kingscote: A Victorian Landscape in Newport
    June 30: Frederick Law Olmsted and Sons: Masters of American Landscape Architecture
    July 7: The Breakers Cutting Garden: Caring for the Gilded Age Landscape
    July 14: The Elms: A Classical Revival Garden
    July 21: Green Animals: An American Original

    Admission for each lecture: Preservation Society members $10, general admission $15.  Advance registration is required.  You may register on-line at www.newportmansions.org, or call 401-847-1000, ext. 154.  If you wish to register for the entire lecture series as part of a RISD Continuing Education course, please contact RISD at 401-454-6209.

    http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2111/3540539032_3e82652ee7.jpg

  • Wednesday, September 23, 10 am – 12 noon – Four Centuries of Garden History at Strawbery Banke

    Take a special Curator’s tour through New England garden history on Wednesday, September 23 beginning at 10:00 a.m. as the New England Wildflower Society explores the site that Garden Design magazine recognized as one of four sites in the world teaching about change over time in an original landscape. Gardens range from native landscapes and 17th century raised-bed kitchen gardens to high Victorian gardens/hothouse, immigrant gardens, a 100 year-old Colonial  Revival garden, and a Victory Garden from World War II.  The tour focuses on garden trends and historic design as well as heirloom plants and historic use.  Teaching gardens include a Victorian Children’s Garden, Herb garden and heritage orchards. Participants have access to heirloom seeds from the gardens as we progress through the historic and cultural landscapes.  Tour does not include admission to the museum, but participants are encouraged to stay for lunch and an afternoon visit to the site. John Forti will lead the group, limited to 20 participants, and the fee is $18 for NEWFS members and $22 for nonmembers.  To register, and get directions, log on to www.newfs.org or call 508-877-7630.

    http://cache.boston.com/bonzai-fba/Globe_Photo/2008/05/02/1209733068_5788.jpg

  • Sunday, July 19, 3 – 4:30 p.m. – Curves, Carpets and Color – Romantic and Victorian Gardening in America

    Historic New England (www.historicnewengland.org) invites you to Castle Tucker, 2 Lee Street in Wiscasset,  Maine on Sunday, July 18, from 3 to 4:30 pm, when author Martha McDowell explores the development of an American landscaping style from the formal plans of the eighteenth century to the elaborate designs of Victorian high style.  The program is co-sponsored by the Maine Antiques Dealers’ Association.

    Marta McDowell lives, writes and gardens in Chatham, New Jersey.  She shares her garden with her husband, Kirke Bent, her crested cockatiel, Sydney, and approximately 30,000 honeybees.  Her garden writing has appeared in popular publications such as Woman’s Day, Fine Gardening and The New York Times.  Scholars and specialists have read her essays on American authors and their horticultural interests in the journals Hortus and Arnoldia.

    Following the relationship between the pen and the trowel led Marta to the poet Emily Dickinson.  Marta’s book, Emily Dickinson’s Gardens, was published by McGraw-Hill in 2005.  If you visit the Emily Dickinson Museum in Amherst, Massachusetts, you can stroll the grounds with a landscape audio tour that Marta scripted in 2007.

    Marta teaches landscape history and preservation at the New York Botanical Garden and Drew University.  She teaches gardening classes for the Chautauqua Institution.  A popular lecturer on topics ranging from design history to plant combinations, she has been a featured speaker at locations ranging from Wave Hill to the Garden Club of Philadelphia and the Cummer Museum of Art in Jacksonville, Florida.

    Marta’s latest gardening adventure was a six-month working holiday in England.  She interned at the Royal Horticultural Society’s Rosemoor in Devon and at the Chelsea Physic Garden in London.

    Her husband summed up Marta’s biography as “I am, therefore I dig.”

    $5 for Members of Historic New England, $10 for non-Members.  Pre-registration is recommended.