Stories
- Book extract
What the wind can bring
In this extract from ‘This Book is a Plant’, Amanda Thomson shares a newfound fascination with flowers, and reveals why our relationship with plants can also be complicated.
- Article
Illuminated manuscripts, illuminating medicines
From rare bugs to exorbitantly priced plant parts, find out more about the artistic and medical uses of pigments from the past.
- Article
Our endless quest for eternal youth
From poisonous 16th-century cosmetics to the latest “vampire facelift”, discover the fashions in unsavoury methods for improving our appearance.
Catalogue
- Pictures
- Online
Two cranesbill plants (Geranium molle and Geranium columbinum) and a storksbill plant (Erodium cicutarium). Coloured etching by C. Pierre, c. 1865, after P. Naudin.
Naudin, Philibert, active 1870.Date: [1865]Reference: 24679i- Books
The woad plant and its dye / by Jamieson B. Hurry.
Hurry, Jamieson B. (Jamieson Boyd), 1857-1930.Date: 1930- Pictures
- Online
Lady's bedstraw (Galium verum L.): entire flowering plant with separate enlarged flower. Coloured etching by M. Bouchard, 1772.
Date: [1772]Reference: 16744i- Pictures
- Online
Dyeing: dyers' and fullers' mills for extracting plant dyes. Coloured engraving by J. Pass.
Pass, John, active 1797-1815.Reference: 45419i- Books
- Online
Account of a new species of nerium, the leaves of which yield indigo ... To which is added, a brief account of ... experiments made ... to throw ... light on the theory of that artificial reproduction. Also descriptions of two other plants, which yield indigo, and of one from Pegu, said to yield a green dye / [William Roxburgh].
Roxburgh, William, 1751-1815.Date: [1811]