Calling Cards of Darwin, Paxton, and Other Gardening Greats Go on Display for First Time

The Royal Horticultral Society has made 756 cartes de visite or calling cards of important horticulturists available to the public online for the first time.

The cards, which date from the 19th century and consist of early photographs of individuals, were shared and traded among friends. Cards in the RHS collection, which came into the charity’s care via entomologist and former Society Director, Andrew Murray, and plant trader, Richard Dean, include nurserymen, flower growers, professional gardeners, botanists, and entomologists, many of whom are depicted nowhere else.  

The collection also includes more familiar faces, such as Joseph Paxton who saved the modern banana on a Derbyshire estate, prolific plant collector Charles Darwin and the then King and Queen of Belgium. Horticulturists who feature in the collection include:

• Nathaniel Bagshaw Ward, English doctor and inventor of the Wardian case, an early type of terrarium that allowed plants to be sealed in and kept alive for long periods without watering
• Anne Pratt, one of the best-known botanical artists of the Victorian era who became a household name with her book Wild Flowers of the Year (1852) - Queen Victoria personally requested copies of all her works but she failed to achieve critical acclaim in her time
• Sarah Backhouse, a prominent female daffodil breeder who bred the first pink-cupped daffodil in collaboration with her husband Robert
• Sir William Hooker, botanist, plant collector, and the first Director of The Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew who went on to establish it as one of the greatest botanic collections in the world