The wonderful world of scientific nomenclature has embedded a ‘secret’ history of plant hunters and horticulturalists in the plants and flower we grow in our gardens. The honour of naming a new species was taken by many as an opportunity to honour past heroes or current friends, but the temptation of having ones own name go down in history was often too much to resist, especially after a lifetime of ‘derring-do’ plant hunting with little other reward. Markedly different from the naming of cultivars, we will encounter fewer from outside of the closed world of plants.
East Anglia’s low rainfall and increasingly mild winters give us conditions suited to growing many plants from the Mediterranean and similar climates from around the world. After establishment med plants can cope with periods of summer drought without extra watering making it easy to create a more sustainable water wise garden. On this course we will look at the flora of the region and see ways that plants have been shaped by their environment to cope with the baking heat of summer.
This taster session will focus on close-up observational drawing as well as achieving quick preparatory sketches to use in later compositions. With demonstrations, advice and individual tuition as you work, this is a perfect workshop for beginners or those looking to improve their drawing technique. Materials will be provided including sketchbooks, paper, a variety of artist quality graphite pencils, graphite sticks, boards and stools. You can, of course, bring your own materials if you prefer.
This course is suitable for beginners, as well as those with some prior experience.
We will explore the range of herbs growing at Botanic Garden, alongside those available in the shops, and will look at both traditional and contemporary uses. We will examine how this diverse range of plants has been used by different cultures through the ages. How can leaves that look quite similar taste so different (e.g. parsley and coriander) and how can leaves that taste similar look so different (e.g. tarragon and Thai basil)? As part of the course we will make a variety of herb-based concoctions, such as salsa verde, herbal tea and herb butter.
The consumption of fruits and vegetables is vital to maintain a diverse, balanced and healthy diet. But have you ever stopped to consider what impact our consumption of plants and plant products has on the plant itself at the different stages through its lifecycle? Plants have evolved myriad methods to defend themselves from predation (and hence consumption by humans) before reproducing, but we have developed ways to overcome many of these powerful plant defences.
Humphry Repton (1752–1818) ambitiously styled himself Capability Brown’s successor: the century’s next great improver of landed property. Developing a new aesthetic, which he termed ‘Ornamental Gardening’, his landscapes were laced with flowers and crammed with exotic features. Immortalized in Jane Austen’s novel Mansfield Park, Repton turned his hand to everything from ghoulish garden mausoleums to George IV’s seaside palace, Brighton Pavilion.
Keeping a sketchbook is the best habit an artist can have. The more you draw from reality the easier it will be to develop your own style and compositions. Discover fun methods to develop your sketching in Cambridge Botanic Garden with illustrator Karin Eklund. Using the garden and Glasshouses as our starting point, Karin will give creative prompts to get you started and introduce new materials and techniques throughout the day. Looking carefully at plants and drawing from observation will be our starting point, gradually introducing elements of imagination, memory and found materials.
Essential oils extracted from plants are a rich source of medicinal compounds that are harnessed in aromatherapy. This course will introduce aromatherapy and essential oils, look at some of the commonly used oils and explore the plants they come from. We will see how these oils are obtained and used and how you can be sure that you’re getting the oil you expect. Weather permitting, we’ll also visit some of the essential-oil providing plants which grow in the Garden.
Yellow is notoriously difficult for the botanical artist to portray, without the end result looking ‘dirty’ because of the use of greys for shadows. With Janie’s help you will explore the possibilities of using anything but grey to produce good shadows on yellow flowers. You will be shown how to apply a first layer of soluble pencil/watercolour quite quickly to colour the whole subject. Once dry, oil or wax-based pencils will be used over this to create amazing illustrations and add finesse and detail. The end result is an illustration as good as any done with pure w
Join tutor Emma James on this two day workshop to print your own sketchbooks. After collecting fallen leaves and natural materials from the Garden, you will learn different printmaking techniques by combining plant materials and creating layered prints by printing onto cotton rag and assorted papers. Experiment with masks and ghost prints to create individual and subtle images inspired by plants and vistas from the gardens.
