OBITUARY
STELLA ROSS-CRAIG (1906-2006)

Stella Ross-Craig who died on Monday 6th February aged 99 was the finest and most comprehensive illustrator of British flora. Unusually she trained as an artist as well as a botanist and was able to combine sound botanical knowledge with sure draughtsmanship. She produced fine work for Curtis’s Botanical Magazine and Hooker’s Icones Plantarum, which earned her a well-deserved reputation as a superb illustrator. Her masterpiece, Drawings of British Plants, which was published as a series of paperbacks between 1948 and 1973, brought her international recognition as a botanical illustrator. Wilfred Blunt in his 1950 classic The Art of Botanical Illustration wrote: “In the making of scientific black-and-white line illustrations, Stella Ross-Craig stands unrivalled”. In 1999 she became only the sixth person to receive the Kew Award medal. 55 of the originals for Drawings of British Plantswere exhibited at Kew Gardens Gallery, now Cambridge Cottage, in 2003. This was her first art exhibition – at the age of 95. Stella Ross-Craig would have been 100 on the 19th of March. Her husband, Robert Sealy, a botanist, who also worked at Kew, predeceased her.

Colin Hawes