Jane Webb Loudon (1807-1858)

Jane Loudon was introduced to horticultural writing through her husband, John Claudius Loudon, a landscape gardener and architect who was the most influential horticultural journalist. After her husband’s death, she was left penniless with a young daughter to raise and turned to writing books in which she attempted to unravel the complications of botany for ladies and young readers. She wrote that she “was not trying to make women usurp the place of men, but to render them rational and intelligent beings.” She promoted self-improvement for her female readers but within prevailing gender ideas about separate spheres for men and women. The growing numbers of the middle class, caught up in the passion for flowers and gardening, were an eager audience for gardening manuals. For 15 years Loudon produced books and played a crucial role in the popularization of plant science in nineteenth-century Britain. The typical style of her illustrations involved grouping flowers to form bouquets which made her designs popular to copy as well as being used for decoupage on trays, lampshades and tables.