Skip to main content

Description

Across the world hundreds of botanic gardens combine scientific research, conservation and beauty with public access, with Kew Gardens alone attracting around one million visitors a year.

For centuries they have variously focused on cultivating medicinal and exotic plants, introducing lucrative crops such as tea and rubber to new countries, preserving international plant collections, scientific classification and research – or have combined all these things.

Sarah Rutherford here tells their story from the sixteenth century up to their long heyday in the last two hundred years. She explains the gardens' design and architecture, the personalities and institutions associated with them, their important role in research and conservation, and their appeal to millions of visitors.

Table of Contents

Introduction: A Living Laboratory
The First Botanic Gardens: Physic Gardens in Europe
The Blossoming of British Botanic Gardens
Colonial Botanic Gardens
The United States of America
The Twentieth Century: Education and Conservation
What Makes a Botanic Garden?
Places to VIsit
Further Reading
Index

Product details

Published 10 Feb 2015
Format Ebook (Epub & Mobi)
Edition 1st
Pages 64
ISBN 9781784420536
Imprint Shire Publications
Illustrations 22 b/w; 33 col
Series Shire Library
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

About the contributors

Related Titles

Environment: Staging