IHR History of Gardens and Designed Landscapes Seminars – Spring/ Summer Term 2025
The History of Gardens and Landscapes Seminar provides a forum for historians and researchers, artists, practioners and interested members of the public to explore and discuss issues related to the history, use and meaning of gardens and the designed landscape and their importance in the public realm today.
The seminars are designed to advance knowledge and create discourse across differing but related disciplines, all of which look to gardens, landscapes and their histories as a key focus or inspiration. It aims to explore new ideas, discover new voices and define new approaches to the subject as well as to provide an opportunity to critically explore more traditional approaches and concepts.
For enquiries: gardenhistory.ihr@gmail.com.
For details of the spring/summer term lectures click here
The Art Fund
Where to see art outdoors: Sculpture parks and art gardens to visit now
Art and the great outdoors – have you ever known a better pairing? Head to these venues to see art in the open air, in dramatic garden and parkland settings.
From Barbara Hepworth to Damien Hirst, artists have long been making work inspired by the great outdoors – and the great outdoors is the perfect place in which to see it.
Featuring sculpture by legendary artists including Elisabeth Frink, Antony Gormley and many more, these gardens and sculpture parks present work that’s intended to be at one with nature, perfect for a wander in the fresh air.
Why not plan a visit to see these impressive structures for yourself. And if you have a National Art Pass, you’ll get fantastic benefits at all of these locations.
The Garden Museum
Cecil Beaton’s Garden Party – New Exhibition, 14th May – 21 September 2025
Best known for his iconic and glamorous fashion photography, Sir Cecil Beaton had a bouquet of creative talents: he was also an accomplished costume and set designer for film, theatre and ballet; a gifted painter and illustrator; and in 1937 he was appointed court photographer to the British Royal Family. Cecil Beaton’s Garden Party will be the first exhibition to examine the common thread weaving through all aspects of Beaton’s artistic work: gardens and flowers.
British Library 2025 exhibitions
The Radical Power of Gardening: Jamaica Kincaid and Olivia Laing
Two acclaimed writers in a special event to launch the British Library exhibition, Unearthed: the Power of Gardening
Unearthed the Power of Gardening 2nd May – 10th August
From beautiful botanical illustrations to the world’s oldest mechanised lawnmower, ancient herbals to guerrilla gardening zines, Unearthed reveals how gardeners have cultivated more than just plants – they’ve sown the seeds of change.
Dive into gardening’s role in our health and wellbeing, see how people have reimagined our homes, towns and cities to create green spaces, and uproot the tangled histories of the plants that grow in our gardens today.
Among an incredible collection of books, manuscripts, photographs, artworks and historical tools, highlights include:
- the first English gardening manual: Thomas Hill’s 1558 guide on how to tend a garden
- Charles Darwin’s vasculum, for collecting plant specimens on the Beagle voyage
- the only surviving illustrated Old English herbal
- an oil portrait of John Ystumllyn, one of Britain’s earliest documented Black gardeners
- Gertrude Jekyll’s boots: a trailblazing gardener, writer, artist, and one of the 20th century’s most influential garden designers
- striking botanical art by European, Indian, Chinese and Caribbean artists
- four short films following Coco Collective, an Afro-diaspora led community garden that opened as a response to the Covid-19 pandemic
- a Victorian Wardian case, the mini travelling greenhouse that enabled thousands of living plant specimens to be moved around the world.
Unearthed celebrates gardening as a force for creativity, resilience and community through the remarkable stories of the people and plants that shape our gardens.
The exhibition is supported by a donation made in memory of Melvin R Seiden, with thanks to Stanley Smith (UK) Horticultural Trust for additional support.
Further information and booking here
Ashmolean Museum
In Bloom: How plants changed our world
What do we really know about the plants and flowers in our gardens and window boxes?
Beyond their beauty, many have hidden histories – tales of exploration, obsession, and knowledge.
This major new exhibition takes visitors on a journey from Oxford to the farthest corners of the world and back, uncovering the global stories behind some of Britain’s most beloved blooms – from roses and tulips to camellias and peonies.
Featuring over 100 artworks and objects, including drawings, paintings, rare prints, and ceramics, In Bloom explores our changing relationship with the natural world.
From the fascinating stories of curiosity and ingenuity of early plant explorers to the networks that shaped global trade, this exhibition reveals how the pursuit of exotic plants transformed landscapes, economies, and cultures, leaving a legacy that still shapes our world today.
Tickets available autumn 2025 for March 2026 opening.
The Alpine Garden Society has a programme of events, zoom lectures, seed exchanges and regional groups
The Cottage Garden Society has a North Oxford Group
The Oxford Special Interest Group The Oxfordshire Flora Group specialising in plant identification meetings