Bunyards Nursery (also known as Bunyard & Co., or Bunyard's Royal Nursery) was a nursery founded in 1796 at Allington, near

Maidstone Maidstone is the largest Town status in the United Kingdom, town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the centre of the town, l ...

. It specialised in fruit and roses.

History

Bunyard's Nursery was established on 16 September 1796 near Maidstone, established by James Bunyard. Before the arrival of the railways, business was local and developed gradually. From the 1860s, the nursery acquired land in Allington where

orchards An orchard is an intentional plantation of trees or shrubs that is maintained for food production. Orchards comprise fruit- or nut-producing trees that are generally grown for commercial production. Orchards are also sometimes a feature of lar ...

were planted. It was nearly bankrupted in 1879 but George Bunyard was able to win a contract to supply half a million trees to

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and the business recovered and continued to expand through the late 1800s. The nursery became the Royal Nursery

by appointment Royal warrants of appointment have been issued for centuries to tradespeople who supply goods or services to a royal court or certain royal personages. The royal warrant enables the supplier to advertise the fact that they supply to the issuer of t ...

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in January 1901. Her reign of 63 year ...

and grew fruit trees across over 300 acres and within 66 glasshouses. In the late 1950s, Bunyards and Laxton Brothers amalgamated and ran as Bunyards and Laxtons Nurseries, operating from Brampton Nurseries in Huntingdon.

Bunyard family

James Bunyard (fl. 1790s – 1810s) established the nursery. George Bunyard (5 February 1841 – 22 January 1919) becan working in the nursery in 1855 and became a partner in 1863 then head in 1881. He secured its reputation as a leading producer of fruit trees. He was involved in the 1888 Apple and Pear Conference, speaking about commercial orchards. George's son, Edward Ashdown Bunyard (14 December 1878 – 19 October 1939), joined the Nursery from 1896 and he and his younger brother (George) Norman (1886 – 1969) took over when George died during the

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of 1919. Norman was the first secretary of the British Iris Society. Edward was considered a leading pomologist and was involved in the emerging science of

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinians, Augustinian ...

. He was a member of the

Royal Horticultural Society The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), founded in 1804 as the Horticultural Society of London, is the UK's leading gardening charity. The RHS promotes horticulture through its five gardens at Wisley (Surrey), Hyde Hall (Essex), Harlow Carr ...

council and helped set up commercial trials at

Wisley Wisley is a village and civil parish in Surrey, England between Cobham and Woking, in the Borough of Guildford. It is the home of the Royal Horticultural Society's Wisley Garden. The River Wey runs through the village and Ockham and Wisley C ...

in 1922. He also helped to establish the

National Fruit Collection The United Kingdom's National Fruit Collection is one of the largest collections of fruit trees and plants in the world. Over 2,040 varieties of apple, 502 of pear, 350 of plum, 322 of cherry and smaller collections of bush fruits, nuts and grap ...

Brogdale Brogdale is a hamlet in Kent, England, immediately south of the M2 motorway (Great Britain), M2 motorway, south of Faversham. It is one of several hamlets making up the civil parishes in England, civil parish of Ospringe and is in the Borough ...

, insisting that a living 'reference library' of fruits should be preserved as an example against which to check new varieties.

Legacy

The nursery supplied plants to

Vita Sackville-West Victoria Mary, Lady Nicolson, Order of the Companions of Honour, CH (née Sackville-West; 9 March 1892 – 2 June 1962), usually known as Vita Sackville-West, was an English author and garden designer. Sackville-West was a successful nov ...

for

Sissinghurst Sissinghurst is a small village in the borough of Tunbridge Wells in Kent, England. Originally called ''Milkhouse Street'' (also referred to as ''Mylkehouse''), Sissinghurst changed its name in the 1850s, possibly to avoid association with the s ...

when she planted the rose garden in 1937. Bunyard roses were also supplied to Hidcote, Kiftsgate and Constance Spry's garden at

Chelsfield Chelsfield is an area in southeast London, England, within the London Borough of Bromley and, prior to 1965, in the historic county of Kent. It lies south of Goddington, west of Well Hill, north of Pratt's Bottom and east of Green Stree ...

. Bunyard's catalogues are held by

Oregon State University Oregon State University (OSU) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Corvallis, Oregon, United States. OSU offers more than 200 undergraduate degree programs and a variety of graduate and doctor ...

archives and valued by historians for the information that Edward Bunyard included on the dates of introductions of a wide variety of fruits. In 2013, local politician Dan Daley was part of a campaign to have the former nursery site designated as a local nature reserve to protect an estimated 20,000 protected species living there.{{Cite news , last=Cole , first=Angela , date=26 February 2013 , title=Nursery must be saved , url=https://www.kentonline.co.uk/maidstone/news/nursery-must-be-saved-a55489/ , access-date=20 March 2025 , work=KentOnline

References

British horticulturists Companies established in the 18th century 1796 establishments in Great Britain Companies of the United Kingdom