The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) was originally called 'the horticultural society of London' and was the idea of a man named John Wedgwood. Although he suggested his idea in 1800, it was not for another 4 years, until 1804, that the first meeting took place on the 7th March at Hatchards bookshop in Piccadilly, London.
The Royal Horticultural Society
Founded by Sir Joseph Banks and John Wedgwood the horticultural society of London's aim was to collect plant information and to encourage the improvement of horticultural practice.
In the 1820's they had their first flower show, the original prototype of today's shows such as the Chelsea flower show. During the 1850's however, they faced a major financial crisis due to lack of memberships and funding, because of this the society had to sell their library full of rare books and drawings. It was not until 1861 that the society received their royal charter by Prince Albert, this royal support helped increase membership and funding, they also developed a new garden at Kensington the same year, and by 1866, they had rebuilt their library.
Today the Royal Horticultural Society's mission is "To be the leading organisation in demonstrating excellence in horticulture and promoting gardening."
To help realise their mission the Royal Horticultural Society has three main aims, these are:
In order to sustain and deliver these aims they have three sustaining goals these are:
The Royal Horticultural Society work in 5 main areas, shows, gardens, learning, community, RHS shops and science and advice. Of the shows, the Chelsea Flower show is probably the most well known, and between all their shows they receive 650,000 visitors a year.
Learning is where they work with schools and communities across the country, there are currently 6800 schools registered with the RHS. The learning area also encompasses the range of qualifications and training schemes the RHS offers.
Community is the work they do for the community, such as Britain in Bloom, the RHS took over running the Britain in Bloom competition in 2002, and the RHS library. The RHS library known as the Lindly Library is based mainly in Westminster with the rest in libraries in each of the gardens. Lindly Library has over 50,000 books, 1,500 periodicals and 18,000 botanical drawings and is thought to be one of the worlds finest collections.
The RHS shops sell plants and products such as books, seeds, jams, honey and fruit wines.
The Royal Horticultural Society's science and advice area produces not only information on plant genes, but also publishes papers, as well as running lectures and seminars.
The most famous aspect of the Royal Horticultural Society is their gardens. They currently own four gardens throughout the UK. They received the Wisly garden is Surry in 1903, the Rosemoor garden in Devon in 1987 and the Hyde Hall garden in Essex in 1993. Most recently in 2001, they acquired Harlow Carr through a merger with the Northern Horticultural Society. The gardens have a huge variety of plant species as well as innovative designs. In 2008, the gardens received 1.3 million visitors.
In the year 2009 the Royal Horticultural Society had an income of £64.55 million, of this £3.4 million was from legacies and voluntary donations, £24.13 million from trading, £16 million from their shows and £14 million from membership subscriptions.
For the same year, their expenditure was £61.55 million, £924,000 was spent on generating voluntary donations and legacies, £20.2 million on trading, and £16 million from their shows.
The Royal Horticultural Society has many ways to raise funds, from regular voluntary donations, member ship subscriptions, partnerships, and volunteers. They also run campaigns and appeals that people can donate to and help with.