Royal associations with Kew is Kew's only surviving 17th-century building apart from
Kew Palace. '' by
Thomas Gainsborough by Philippe Mercier, dated 1733. A musical portrait of Frederick, Prince of Wales and his sisters uses the Dutch House, the present-day Kew Palace, as its plein-air'' backdrop. Gallery, Kew Gardens 's impression of
Kew Green in 1892 at
St Anne's Church The Tudors and Stuarts Charles Somerset, 1st Earl of Worcester ( 1460–1526) was granted lands at Kew in 1517. When he died in 1526 he left his Kew estates to his third wife, Eleanor, with the remainder to his son George. In 1538, Sir George Somerset sold the house for £200 to
Thomas Cromwell ( 1485–1540), who resold it for the same amount to
Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk ( 1484–1545). Brandon had probably already inhabited Kew during the life of his wife
Mary Tudor, daughter of
Henry VII and widow of the French king
Louis XII. According to
John Leland's
Cygnea Cantio ("Swan Song"), she stayed in Kew (which he refers to as "Cheva") for a time after her return to England. One of
Henry VIII's closest friends,
Henry Norris ( 1482–1536), lived at Kew Farm, which was later owned by
Elizabeth I's
favourite,
Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester (1532–1588). This large
palatial house on the Thames riverbank predated the royal palaces of Kew Palace and the White House. Excavations at Kew Gardens in 2009 revealed a wall that may have belonged to the property. In Elizabeth's reign, and under the
Stuarts, houses were developed along Kew Green.
West Hall, which survives in West Hall Road, dates from at least the 14th century and the present house was built at the end of the 17th century.
Elizabeth Stuart (1596–1662), daughter of
James I, later known as the "Winter Queen", was given a household at Kew in 1608.
The Hanoverians The
Hanoverians maintained the strongest links with Kew, in particular
Princess Augusta (1719–1772) who founded the botanic gardens and her husband
Frederick, Prince of Wales (1707–1751) who lived at the White House in Kew. Augusta, as
Dowager Princess of Wales, continued to live there until her death in 1772. Frederick commissioned the building of the first substantial
greenhouse at Kew Gardens. In 1772
King George III and
Queen Charlotte moved into the White House at Kew.
Georgian expansion During the
French Revolution, many refugees established themselves in Kew, having built many of the houses of this period. In the 1760s and 1770s the presence of royalty attracted artists such as
Thomas Gainsborough and
Johann Zoffany.
Artists associated with Kew •
Diana Armfield (born 1920) lives in Kew. She is known for landscapes, and has also painted portraits, literary subjects and still lifes. She has a particular interest in flower paintings, and is considered to owe much to the tradition of
Walter Sickert. •
Margaret Backhouse (1818–1896) was a successful British portrait and
genre painter during the 19th century who lived at Lichfield Villas. •
Franz (later Francis) Bauer (1758–1840) was an Austrian
microscopist and
botanical artist who became the first botanical illustrator at Kew Gardens. By 1790 he had settled at Kew, where as well as making detailed paintings and drawings of flower dissections, often at microscopic level, he tutored
Queen Charlotte, her daughter
Princess Elizabeth and
William Hooker in the art of illustration, and often entertained friends and botanists at his home. He is buried at St Anne's, next to Thomas Gainsborough. • The American-born English artist
Walter Deverell (1827–1854), who was associated with the
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, lived at 352 Kew Road, then called Heathfield House. He had a
studio at the end of the garden where there are now garages. In this setting he painted
A Pet (1853)*
Bernard Dunstan (1920–2017) lived in Kew. He was an artist, teacher and author, best known for his studies of figures in interiors and landscapes. At the time of his death, he was the longest serving
Royal Academician. •
Walter Hood Fitch (1817–1892),
botanical illustrator, lived on Kew Green. •
Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788), who is considered one of the most important British artists of the second half of the 18th century, The site is marked by a
blue plaque. Hughes is buried in
Richmond Cemetery. •
Tom Keating (1917–1984), artist,
art restorer and
art forger, lived in Kew from 1961 to 1967. He was best known for his highly publicised crusade against the
art world, his trial for art fraud at the
Old Bailey, and his critically acclaimed
Channel 4 television series
Tom Keating On Painters. •
Joshua Kirby (1716–1774) was a landscape painter, engraver, and writer, whose main artistic focus was "
linear perspective", based on the ideas of English mathematician
Brook Taylor. He was the son of topographer
John Kirby, and the father of the writer
Sarah Trimmer and the
entomologist William Kirby. In 1760 he moved to Kew, where he taught
linear perspective to George III. He was a
Fellow of the Royal Society. He and his wife are buried in the churchyard of St Anne's. • Victorian artist
Marianne North (1830–1890) did not live in Kew, but she left to Kew Gardens her collection of botanic art that she had painted on her extensive overseas travels, and funded a gallery – the
Marianne North Gallery – to house them. • French
Impressionist painter
Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) stayed in 1892 at 10 Kew Green, on the corner of Gloucester Road, now marked by a blue plaque. During his stay he painted
Kew Gardens – Path to the Great Glasshouse (1892)[https://www.wikiart.org/en/camille-pissarro/kew-gardens-path-to-the-great-glasshouse-1892,
Kew Greens (1892)and
Church at Kew (1892)[http://www.wikipaintings.org/en/camille-pissarro/church-at-kew-1892. His third son,
Félix Pissarro (1874–1897), painter,
etcher and
caricaturist, died in a
sanatorium at 262 Kew Road in 1897. •
Charles Shannon (1863–1937), artist best known for his portraits, died in Kew at 21 Kew Gardens Road. •
Matilda Smith (1854–1926), the first official
botanical artist of the
Royal Botanic Gardens, lived at Gloucester Road, Kew. • The painter
Johan Zoffany (1725–1810), who lived at
Strand-on-the-Green, is buried in St Anne's churchyard.
Botanists who have lived in Kew Unsurprisingly, many
botanists have lived in Kew, near the botanic gardens: •
William Aiton (1731–1793), botanist, was appointed director in 1759 of the newly established botanical garden at Kew, where he remained until his death. He effected many improvements at the gardens, and in 1789 he published
Hortus Kewensis, a catalogue of the plants cultivated there. When he died, he was succeeded as director at Kew Gardens by his son
William Townsend Aiton (1766–1849), who was also a botanist, and was born in Kew. William Townsend Aiton was one of the founders of the
Royal Horticultural Society. •
John Patrick Micklethwait Brenan (1917–1985), director of the botanic gardens, lived in Kew and died there on 26 September 1985. He is buried at St. Anne's. •
Sir William Hooker (1785–1865) and his son
Sir Joseph Hooker (1817–1911), botanists and directors of Kew Gardens, lived at 49 Kew Green, Kew. The site is marked by a blue plaque. •
John Hutchinson (1884–1972), botanist, lived on Kew Green, near
Kew Gardens' Herbarium, during the Second World War. •
Daniel Oliver (1830–1916),
Professor of Botany at
University College London 1861–88 and Keeper of Kew Gardens' Herbarium 1864–90, lived on Kew Green. •
Henry Nicholas Ridley (1855–1956), botanist, geologist and
naturalist, died at his home in Kew. •
John Smith (1798–1888), botanist, the first curator at Kew Gardens, lived on Kew Green. He died at Park House, Kew Road, and is buried in
St Anne's churchyard. •
William T Stearn (1911–2001), botanist, who was president of the
Linnean Society, lived in Kew. •
John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (1713–1792), botanist and honorary director of Kew Gardens 1754–72, adviser to Princess Augusta and tutor to George III and, later,
Prime Minister of Great Britain 1762–63, lived at King's Cottage, 33 Kew Green.
Other notable inhabitants Historical figures lived in Kew. lives in Kew. was brought up in Kew. lives in Kew. , novelist and playwright, photographed in 2011 by Stephen Morris, was born in Kew. •
Francis Claude Blake (1867–1954), engineer, lived at 13 Kew Gardens Road. •
David Blomfield (1934–2016), leader of the
Liberal Party group on
Richmond upon Thames Council, writer, book editor and
local historian, lived in Kew. He is buried in Richmond Cemetery. •
Ferruccio Bonavia (1877–1950), violinist, composer and music critic, lived at 352 Kew Road, Kew from 1914 until 1919. •
Tony Bradshaw (1926–2008),
evolutionary ecologist, was born in Kew. •
Ray Brooks (1939–2025), television and film actor, lived in Kew. •
Aggrey Burke (1943–2025), psychiatrist and academic, who was born in Jamaica, spent the majority of his medical career at
St George's Hospital in London, specialising in
transcultural psychiatry and writing literature on changing attitudes towards black people and mental health. In 1959, while still a teenager, he moved to Britain with his parents. The family settled in Kew, where Burke was schooled and was the only black child in his class. • Sir
Arthur Herbert Church (1834–1915), chemist, who was an expert on pottery, stones and the chemistry of paintings, lived and died at Shelsley, a detached house at 21 Ennerdale Road, Kew. The house has since been demolished and the site is now occupied by Voltaire, a
Modernist block of flats designed by Vivien Pilley (A V Pilichowski). •
Richard Cook (1957–2007),
jazz writer, magazine editor and former
record company executive, was born in Kew. •
Stephen Duck ( 1705–1756), poet, lived in Kew. •
Prince Friso of Orange-Nassau (1968–2013), brother of King
Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands, lived in Kew with his wife
Princess Mabel of Orange-Nassau (born 1968). •
Liberal Party leader
Jo Grimond (1913–1993) lived on Kew Green. •
Susanne Groom (1945–2023), historian, author and
curator at
Historic Royal Palaces, lived on High Park Road in Kew. •
John Haverfield Sr (1694–1784), surveyor,
gardener and landscape architect, lived on Kew Green where he had a house built , which was known as Haverfield House. •
Reginald Hawthorn Hooker (1867–1944), civil servant, statistician and
meteorologist, was born in Kew •
John Huntley (1921–2003), film historian, educator and archivist, was born in Kew. •
Elinor May Jenkins (1893–1920),
war poet, and her brother
Arthur Lewis Jenkins (1892–1917), soldier, pilot and war poet, who are buried next to each other in
Richmond Cemetery, lived at the family home at Sussex House, 220 Kew Road. The house has been demolished and its name has been given to a block of flats that has been built on the site. •
Serge Lourie (1946–2024), former Leader of Richmond upon Thames Council, and councillor for Kew for 28 years, lived at Burlington Avenue in Kew. •
Alfred Luff (1846–1933),
cricketer, who made three
first-class appearances for
Surrey in 1867, was born in Kew. •
Phil Lynott (1949–1986), guitarist, songwriter, vocalist and leader of the Irish
rock band
Thin Lizzy, lived in Kew. •
Andrew Millar (1705–1768), Scottish bookseller and publisher, owned a country home on Kew Green and died there in 1768. •
Samuel Molyneux (1689–1728), Member of Parliament and an amateur astronomer, who was married to Lady Elizabeth Diana Capel, the eldest daughter of
Algernon Capell, 2nd Earl of Essex, inherited Kew House on the death of Lady Capel of
Tewkesbury. Molyneux set up an observatory at the house and collaborated there with
James Bradley in innovative designs for reflecting telescopes. •
Desmond Morton (1891–1971), soldier, intelligence officer and personal assistant to
Winston Churchill 1940–45, lived at 22 Kew Green 1952–71. •
Conrad Noel (1869–1942), Church of England priest and prominent
Christian socialist, was born in Royal Cottage, Kew Green. •
Harold Pinter (1930–2008), playwright, dramatist, actor, director and
Nobel Prize laureate, lived from 1960 to 1963 at Fairmead Court, Taylor Avenue, Kew where he wrote his 1961 play
The Collection. •
George Pither (1899–1966), professional footballer, was born in Kew. •
Sir Hugh Portman, 4th Baronet (died 1632), MP for
Taunton, lived in a house opposite
Kew Palace. •
Sir John Puckering (1544–1596), lawyer, politician,
Speaker of the English House of Commons, and
Lord Keeper from 1592 until his death, lived in Kew. •
Harry Scandrett (1892–1977),
flying ace credited with
seven aerial victories during the
First World War, was born in Kew. • Clementina Jacobina Sobieski Schnell (1760–1842), lived for 53 years at the Little Red House on Kew Green. She was related to
Flora MacDonald. Her husband, Francis Schnell, was tutor to Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland. She died in 1842 when her
headdress caught fire. •
Sarah Trimmer (née Kirby; 1741–1810), writer and critic of 18th-century British children's literature, and educational reformer, lived in Kew before her marriage. •
Patrick Troughton (1921–1987), actor, most famous for playing the
Second Doctor in the TV series
Doctor Who, lived in Kew. • Robert Tunstall (c 1759–1833) from
Brentford, who built the second stone
Kew Bridge, died at a house on Kew Green. •
George Vassila (1857–1915), cricketer, was born in Kew. •
Andrew Watson (1856–1921), the world's first
black person to play
association football at international level, retired to London in around 1910 and died of
pneumonia at 88 Forest Road, Kew in 1921. He is buried in
Richmond Cemetery. •
Iolo Williams (1890–1962), author, journalist and Liberal Party politician, lived at
West Hall, Kew from the 1940s until his death in 1962.
Living people •
Geoffrey Archer, fiction writer and former Defence Correspondent of
ITN, lives on Kew Green. •
Mick Avory, musician and former drummer with
The Kinks, lives in Kew. •
Nick Baird, former group corporate affairs director of energy firm
Centrica, lives in Kew. •
Marie-Elsa Bragg, writer, Anglican priest and therapist, lived in Kew as a young child. •
Justin Lee Collins, comedian and television presenter, lives in Kew. •
Sir David Durie, former civil servant and
Governor of Gibraltar, lives in Kew. •
Simon Fowler, social historian and author, lives in Kew. •
Giles Fraser, vicar of
St Anne's Church, Kew, bought a house in Kew in 2023. •
Ruth Gledhill, assistant editor, home and digital, of
The Tablet and a former religion affairs correspondent for
The Times, lives in Kew. •
Krishnan Guru-Murthy, lead presenter of
Channel 4 News, lives in Kew. •
Sir Donald Insall, architect, conservationist and author, lives in Kew. •
Milton Jones, comedian, was brought up in Kew. •
Gabby Logan, TV presenter, and her husband
Kenny Logan,
rugby player, live in Kew. •
Steven McRae,
principal dancer with the
Royal Ballet, lives in Kew. •
Paul Ormerod, economist, has lived in Kew. •
Helen Sharman, the first British woman in space, lives in Kew. •
A. C. H. Smith, novelist and playwright, was born in Kew. •
Jenny Tonge, Baroness Tonge, former MP for
Richmond Park, and a councillor for Kew for nine years, lives in Kew. ==Demography==