From Palms to Pills: Drug Discovery at the Palm House

Step inside the Palm House and discover how exotic plants once shaped modern medicine. This guided tour reveals how Victorian glasshouses were not just architectural marvels or leisure spaces, but cutting‑edge research centres where botany, chemistry, and empire converged.

You’ll hear remarkable stories of plants growing here that became medicines still used today: from saw palmetto, a traditional remedy transformed into a treatment for prostate conditions, to angel’s trumpets, whose striking flowers conceal potent compounds that inspired medicines that flew to the moon, and even tales of witchcraft. Along the way, we explore how careful chemistry turns plant toxins into therapies, and how mistakes in plant identification or ethics led to dramatic failures in drug discovery.

The tour also confronts the darker side of plant science, touching on colonial exploitation, and horrible historical abuses of natural products discovery, reminding us that science was not always ethical.

Blending history, pharmacology, and storytelling, we will embark on a fascinating journey through plants that heal, harm, and transform society.

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

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Host or Publisher Sefton Park Palm House