The exact year in which the UCLA Herbarium was first established is unclear, but it likely dates back to the period before 1929, when UCLA was still a branch campus of UC Berkeley located on Vermont Avenue in downtown Los Angeles.
The core of the Herbarium was established through the acquisition of preserved collections from the short-lived “California Botanical Garden” (CBG; 1928-1935), a project led by Elmer D. Merrill, the former Dean of Agriculture at UC Berkeley. Before its closure, the CBG had amassed a large herbarium which was transferred to UCLA just as the University began offering classes at its new Westwood campus in 1929.
These collections included specimens from the Bonati and J.J.P. Tapp Herbaria that were purchased by Merrill, as well as Merrill’s own personal collections from his research in the Philippines. Since then, the Herbarium has grown to nearly 150,000 vascular plant specimens and contains the collections of many other famed botanists including Carl Epling, Margaret and Harlan Lewis, Mildred E. Mathias, Peter H. Raven, Henry J. Thompson, Jonathan Sauer, Elizabeth McClintock, Martha Hilend Kinsey, and Kei Nakai.