How a Victorian-era herb garden continues to inspire present day curiosity at Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne.

This November, we’re celebrating 40 years of the Herb and Medicinal Collection at Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne. See more details below:

Forty years after it was reimagined on the site of Melbourne’s original medicinal garden, the Herb and Medicinal Collection at Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria continues to offer visitors a living connection to the ways plants have shaped health, culture, food and wellbeing across generations.

Established in 1986 with the support of the Herb Society of Victoria and the Friends of the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne, the collection occupies a site with a much longer story. Its roots stretch back to the 1880s, when then-director W.R. Guilfoyle created a medicinal garden for the cultivation and study of plants used in traditional and contemporary medicine. The garden later became a teaching resource for pharmacy students from the University of Melbourne and, at its peak, featured hundreds of plants from around the world.

The collection has evolved alongside changing understandings of horticulture and conservation. As awareness of biodiversity protection, sustainable plant collecting and climate change has grown, so too has the approach to managing and interpreting the garden. The collection now balances historical plant use with contemporary conversations about conservation, responsible cultivation and cultural knowledge.

Read the full media release and download pictures here: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/vqd3ba03x55fdqmru114n/ACneBSnwaPYi9blXr2QWIz0?rlkey=icwwyjn812r1m3wb6kduoplap&st=zhy8vikz&dl=0

If you’d like to arrange an interview with the collection curator, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

Thank you,

Andie