Kew at Work Gallery
Choose from 343 images in our Kew at Work collection.
Medicinal Plants
Botanical Art
History
The Gardens
Kew at Work
> History
> Economic Botany
> Under the microscope
> Kew abroad
> Kew Science
> In the gardens
Architecture
Endangered plants
Natural Environment
Plants and Fungi
Trees and Shrubs
Wildlife
Images Dated

The Kew Gardens Question
The Kew Gardens Question. This political cartoon was published in 1878 as part of the ongoing debate as to whether the public should be allowed into the gardens in the mornings, before 1pm. Officially, only botanist and botanical artists were allowed morning access, with the Director's permission. The Kew Gardens Public Rights Defence Association was set up and successfully campaigned against this. The author of the article accompanying this cartoon smuggled himself into a morning session at the Gardens and claimed that those eminent botanists inside were mostly fast asleep in garden chairs and other gentlemen were "engaged in testing the effects of cigar smoke on open-air evergreens."
© RBG KEW

Henry Ridley
When Henry Ridley took over directorship of the Singapore Botanic Gardens, (1888-1911)there were many overgrown jungle areas and he was tasked with making a preliminary forest survey. Ridley is holding a machete for cutting his way through the undergrowth, while his assistant is carrying a vasculum for any interesting specimens they might come upon.Ridley on foot from the Henry Ridley Papers, RBG Kew Archives HNR/1/2/9/66
© The Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

Cultivation of Cinchona succirubra trees on the Madulsima Cinchona Cos estate, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) 1882

Cultivation of Cinchona succirubra trees on the Madulsima Cinchona Cos estate, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) 1882
Cultivation of Cinchona succirubra trees on the Madulsima Cinchona Cos estate, Ceylon (Sri Lanka) 1882. The plants pictured are 8 -10 years old. The outer bark has been shaved and the trunks covered with grass to encourage the regrowth of the bark, from which quinine alkaloids were extracted for use as a malaria medicine
© RBG KEW