[1] He was born at Braunschweig in Germany, but studied at Leiden University and spent his professional life working in the Dutch East Indies and in the Netherlands, where he was Director of the Rijksherbarium (state herbarium) at Leiden.

His name is sometimes given in the Dutch language form Karel Lodewijk Blume, but the original German spelling is the one most widely used in botanical texts: even then there is confusion, as he is sometimes referred to as K.L.

He carried out extensive studies of the flora of southern Asia, particularly in Java, then a colony of the Netherlands.

From 1823 to 1826 Blume was Deputy Director of Agriculture at the Bogor Botanical Gardens in Java.

He planned, together with Philipp Franz von Siebold (1796–1866), the foundation of the "Koninklijke Nederlandsche Maatschappij tot aanmoediging van den Tuinbouw".