The Worshipful Company of Gardeners, first mentioned in City Corporation records in 1345, is a survivor from the medieval craft guilds which exercised control over the practice of their particular crafts and ensured a proper training through the system of apprenticeship.
In 1605, after existing for centuries as a mystery or fellowship, the Guild was incorporated by Royal Charter. The Charter sets out the operations controlled by the Company: “The trade, crafte or misterie of gardening, planting, grafting, setting, sowing, cutting, arboring, rocking, mounting, covering, fencing and removing of plants, herbes, seedes, fruites, trees, stocks, setts, and of contryving the conveyances to the same belonging..."
Today, the Company ranks number 66 in the order of precedence of Livery Companies in the City of London.
