Images Dated 2015

Waterlily Pond, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, ca 1900

The waterlily pond, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, ca 1900. The pond was one of Sir William Thiselton-Dyer's additions, heated by condensed steam from the local water supply, making it possible to raise half-hardy aquatic plants. Some of the waterlilies in this photograph were supplied by the French nurseryman Joseph Bory Latour-Marliac. One of the first growers to successfully hybridize waterlillies, Marliac is probably best known for his yellow-flowered cultivar Nymphaea Marliacea Chromatella, which he sent to Kew in 1887. He is also renowned for contributing many of the waterlilies in Monet's garden at Giverny

© RBG Kew

Citrus bergamia, 1887

Coloured plate of Citrius Bergamia from K?hler's Medizinal-Pflanzen, Vol. 3, 1887. Current accepted plant name is Citrus x limon

© RBG Kew

Stella Ross Craig, botanical artist

Stella Ross-Craig, born in 1906, received an early induction into plant life from her father, a botanist, who taught his young daughter to identify wild flowers. At 18 she enrolled in Thanet Art School and attended evening classes in botany. In 1929 she began contributing to Curtis's Botanical magazine and went on to submit more than 300 illustrations over the next 50 years. Her virtuosity for working in black and white is most effectively displayed in what is probably her most exceptional work "Drawings of British Plants". Produced between 1948 and 1973 it includes all native species excluding grasses and sedges, comprising 1316 plates in 31 parts

© RBG KEW