ONLINE COURSE Women plant hunters from the 18th-20th centuries

Wed 10 November 2021

online

Men dominate the established history of plant hunting, but delving deeper, one discovers an astonishing array of female travellers, from cross dressing sailors to ‘diplomatic wives’ and footloose spinster artists, who collected plants from across the continents. Rarely setting off as employed ‘hunters’, these women found themselves drawn into the lure of plant collecting, sometimes from boredom, others from necessity, sometimes incidentally. Spurred on by communication with Charles Darwin or Kew, they noted new plants, sent specimens or recorded exotic flora on canvas, all too often to have their findings dismissed. In this session we will explore the lives and plant contributions of these overlooked women plant collectors from the 18th – 20th centuries including Jeanne Baret, Maria Graham Callcott, Lady Anne Monson, Lady Charlotte Wheeler-Cuffe, Isobel Wylie Hutchinson, Marianne Mason, and Marianne North. From the equator to the Arctic, women were ‘doing it for themselves’!

Twigs Way has worked in historic landscapes for over twenty years, commencing with her PhD studies on medieval parks and expanding into gardens and landscapes of the subsequent periods. Her present work in historic landscapes consists of lecturing, research, writing, publishing, crafting landscape management plans, visiting historic sites, and indulging an enduring fascination with the history of female gardeners.

Please note this is an online course. No specialist software is required to participate, but a device with a microphone and webcam will be needed. Full joining instructions will be emailed a few days before the date of the course.

This is a live interactive course, and will not be made available as a recording to watch at a later date.

Cost: £25