Exclusive Members' Event – A Botanical History: The Ashmolean & Garden Museum

An Exclusive Event for Members of the Ashmolean

With Emma House, curator at the Garden Museum in London.

Join us for a special talk exploring the shared histories of two remarkable institutions.

Guest speaker Emma House, Curator at London’s Garden Museum, will trace the rich connections between the Ashmolean and the Garden Museum through the lens of the exhibition In Bloom: How Plants Changed Our World.

It was thanks to the collections and gardens of John Tradescant the Elder (c. 1570-1638) and his son John Tradescant the Younger (1608-1662), that the original Garden Museum in London came into being. The Tradescant Collection as it became known, was later given to the University of Oxford by our founder, Elias Ashmole (1617-1692) and combined with an older University collection to become the Ashmolean Museum, which opened in 1683.

From botanical knowledge to collecting practices, this talk reveals how plants have shaped museums, ideas and cultural exchange across centuries.

This talk will be recorded and will be distributed to ticketholders following the event.