Chelsea Physic Garden
66 Royal Hospital Road, Chelsea, London, SW3 4HS
A four-acre botanic garden founded in 1673, with about 5,000 edible, useful, medicinal and historic plants.
Visit information checked 17 August 2026
Garden UK guide
Why visit Chelsea Physic Garden?
Chelsea Physic Garden was founded beside the Thames in 1673 to train apothecaries in identifying medicinal plants. Its four acres now contain about 5,000 plants arranged around their uses, histories and botanical relationships. The glasshouses add tender species to the outdoor collections, while interpretation explains why particular plants matter. This is a dense garden rather than a long walk, and visitors who read labels carefully will get far more from it than those treating it as a conventional ornamental garden.
What to see
- Study medicinal, edible and useful plants in one of Britain's oldest botanic gardens.
- Visit the glasshouses for tender species that cannot remain outdoors in London.
- Use the labels and interpretation to connect plants with medicine, food and history.
Plan your visit
- Best for
- Botany, medicinal-plant history, labelled collections and visitors who prefer concentrated information to a large landscape.
- Before you go
- The garden has limited seasonal opening and tours depend on availability. Check current tickets, hours, events and accessibility details before visiting.
Garden features
Location
66 Royal Hospital Road, Chelsea, London, SW3 4HS
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