Prized for their exotic beauty and astonishing variety, orchids are the royal family of the plant kingdom. Found in a dazzling array of forms and colors, orchids hard to obtain and harder still to maintainare treasured as the rarest and most exclusive of plants. This glorious volume illustrates the most exquisite specimens of the flower with botanical artworks from the unrivaled collection of the Royal Horticultural Society in England.

Reproduced here for the first time are the stunning watercolor portraits commissioned for the Society's prize-winning orchid every year since 1897. These and other spectacular illustrations combine with a text by one of the world's foremost experts on orchids to make this the ultimate pictorial history and reference on the most glamorous flower of all.