Australian Torrenia scabra. Rough-leaved Torenia antique print. Paxton c1842.

by Paxton, Joseph

Antique print of Torenia Scabra found in Australia in 1810 by Robert Brown.

Original hand-coloured lithograph, drawn and lithographed by Samuel Holden for Joseph Paxton's Magazine of Botany & Register of Flowering Plants, published in London c1842.

Sir Joseph Paxton (1803-1865) was a hugely talented man. Starting as a gardener at 14, with little education, his enthusiasm, ability and application were rewarded by employment when 23 as Head Gardener of the Duke of Devonshire’s Chatsworth Estate - one of England’s finest gardens. Although best known as a landscape gardener, Paxton became both architect and engineer, and built glasshouses for cultivation of plants from other climates. His design for a glass house conservatory at Chatsworth for a giant lily, became the basis of Paxton’s design of the Crystal Palace for London's Great International Exhibition of 1851 (for which he was knighted).

Size is 230 x 155mm (9 x 6 inches).