About

Tom Christian is a botanical horticulturist and dendrologist, and one of the UK's leading experts on conifers.  Tom studied Horticulture with Plantsmanship at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, graduating in 2008, and continued to be based there until summer 2017, working closely with the International Conifer Conservation Programme on collaborative projects throughout the UK.  

His work has involved expeditions to collect and study plants around the world, including visits to Chile, China, Japan, Bhutan, Lebanon, Morocco, Turkey, and New Zealand, as well as many European countries and the French Territory of New Caledonia in the South Pacific Ocean. Within the UK and Ireland Tom has visited hundreds of gardens and designed landscapes, working closely with land owners and managers to develop and enhance their plant collections. 

Tom is a trustee of the charity Woodland Heritage, and a member of the IUCN conifer specialist group, the Royal Horticultural Society’s woody plant committee, and of the International Dendrology Society’s science and education committee.  In 2018 he was invited to become Assistant Editor of 'Trees and Shrubs Online', an ambitious, long-term initiative to document the world's temperate tree and shrub species, for which he has also authored new accounts of several groups.

In 2022 Tom was the recipient of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Roy Lancaster Award, awarded to individuals aged 35 or under who have made ‘an exceptional contribution to the practice, science or promotion of horticulture’.