https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/ en Copyright 2011 Sun, 13 Jul 2008 12:01:55 +0000 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/?v=4.33-en http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss So I jumped at the chance to talk to the Send a Cow team in their cheerfully-coloured, busy show garden, right next door to the Climate Change Dome. Gardeners in Africa have a thing or two to teach us about growing plants in a drought, and this garden is packed with ideas. "The idea of a bag garden is that you can grow more vegetables in a smaller space," Kirstine Dunhill, of Send a Cow, tells me. They are tiny, too - hessian sacks about the size of a supermarket carrier bag, yet bursting with healthy veg. There's a secret, of course, to their success. "They have a central column of stones going down the middle," explains Kirstine. "So rather than the water getting stuck in the top layers, it actually filters all the way through." That means even veg planted through pockets cut in the bottom of the bag get enough water. To get the column into the centre of the bag (or pot) take a plastic drinks bottle and cut off the neck and base, giving you a plastic tube. Put the tube in the centre of your pot, and fill it with stones. Pack the compost around it, then lift the tube up, leaving the stones in the soil, then repeat until you get to the top of the pot. Voilà: a stone column running through the compost, ready to take water right to the roots where it's needed. Another fantastic idea I picked up - which could make its way onto my allotment before long - is the keyhole veg bed. This is a raised bed with bells on: it's about 1m (3'6") high, and the outer bed, where the vegetables are growing, slopes down from a central hollow column. There's an access path to the column (giving the bed a "keyhole" shape viewed from above) and inside it is what amounts to a compost bin, held in with hessian: you fill it with kitchen waste, stable manure, grass clippings - whatever you'd put on your compost heap. Then tip on water saved from your washing up, and that's it. "The idea is that the water will drain through and take all the nutrients with it," explains Kirstine. "It's feeding from below the topsoil, so rather than watering on the surface and all the water evaporating, everything's coming up from underneath." In Africa, this garden will feed a family of six through the three-month dry period, when crops in the fields simply dry out. In Britain, as we adapt to more hot, dry summers, techniques like these could make all the difference. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/ideas_that_will_catch_on_here.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/ideas_that_will_catch_on_here.html Sally Nex Sun, 13 Jul 2008 12:01:55 +0000 Ecstasy in a Very Black Box, is even going to a private art collector (look out for this one in a future Turner Prize line-up). Three more are on sale to the general public, so if it's ever been your ambition to own a piece of Hampton Court, now's your chance. Two schools will be getting an instant school garden over the summer holidays: one lucky primary school in Dorset will even have the Best In Show garden, the Dorset Cereals Edible Playground, reconstructed in its grounds, complete with potting shed. The other will have the conceptual garden, Gambling Environments (silver-gilt), re-built in its grounds to encourage children think about looking after their environment. Two other gardens will be going back to horticultural colleges: the Anglian Green Black and White Garden (silver-gilt) will be rebuilt at Capel Manor College in Enfield, while Plumpton College horticultural students will reconstruct their small garden, Shades of Barragan (silver-gilt) as a demonstration garden on the campus. The ones you have a chance to buy are the small gardens Convergence of the Elements, which won a silver medal for Down to Earth Partners Ltd, and Breathing Space... Thinking Place, for the Samaritans (bronze), which is currently up for online auction with charity auction site Buy Once Give Twice. "I think someone's going to get a bargain, actually," says Wendy Allen, who co-designed the garden with Catherine Kenny. "In total, the garden's worth about £25,000 - so far the bidding is up to £1,500. People do wait till the last minute, but I think whatever it comes to it's not going to be the full value." For your money, you'll get a unique steel arch sculpture with twin seats, bespoke paving and a water wall - plus a large silver birch tree and hundreds of pounds' worth of choice plants. And if you're wondering how it'll arrive - well, they'll deliver it on a lorry and leave it on your doorstep as part of the price, or if you pay a bit more, they'll install it for you. "We'll recreate it exactly as it is here in its new space," says Wendy, "All the elements you see here will be included." The sale ends at midnight tonight, so you're still in with a chance - the proceeds go to the Samaritans, so you'll be contributing to a good cause, too. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/growing_growing_gone.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/growing_growing_gone.html Sally Nex Sat, 12 Jul 2008 14:23:09 +0000 four floral marquees, selling everything from acers to zebra grass, you're sure to find the perfect plant for your garden - and there are always new plants to discover, too. I'm planting up a jungle area in my garden at the moment, so I was on the hunt for rich colours and sumptuous leaves. First to catch my eye was Colocasia esculenta 'Black Leaf' on the silver-gilt medal winning Trevena Cross Nurseries stall - utterly gorgeous velvety near-black foliage with almost luminous bright-green veins. Also on Trevena Cross's stand were some of the spectacular new strain of dahlias everyone's talking about this year. These have the sultry, dark foliage of 'Bishop of Llandaff', but with pale, clear flowers: Trevena Cross had 'Knockout' in clearest yellow, while I spotted the equally lovely 'Twyning's After Eight' in the charming mini-show garden from the Botanic Nursery in Wiltshire (also silver-gilt). On this stand I also loved the little marjoram tumbling along the pathways: Origanum 'Pagoda Bells' is a dainty thing, its large, flower-like bracts like petticoats tinted dusky pink. There was a robust display of restios and other South African delights on silver-gilt medal winners Churchtown Nurseries' stall, and here the extraordinary Berzelia rubra really caught my eye. At first I thought it was a miniature conifer: it has needle-like foliage and there are cones nestled in among the branches. But then I touched it, and realised it was soft as a feather: a lovely, tactile plant with a graceful movement about it. Nurseryman Christopher tells me it's a new addition to Churchtown's range, but is looking really promising - it's evergreen and its only special requirement is for a damp soil. Back to my passion for purple, though, and I was very taken with the Perilla frutescens var frutescens stealing the show at Jekka McVicar's stand. This packed display won gold and best exhibit this year, and it was doing a roaring trade with eager customers snapping up everything from purple basil to one of the dozens of different thymes on display. Perilla is a Chinese herb, used against bacterial infections in Chinese medicine, but you can grow it just for its wide, generous deep green leaves, deeply textured with purple undersides. Other plants I added to my 'must-have' list: Heuchera 'Mocha' from Solva Plants, with the most truly bronze-coloured leaves I've ever seen; the glorious purple grass Pennisetum setaceum 'Rubrum', to be found at Foxgrove Plants; and the fabulous dark purple-leaved chilli, 'Chill Out', on the Cuckoo Box Nurseries stall. This had black fruits and red ones on the same plant, making a gorgeous contrast with the leaves: Ali, from Cuckoo Box, tells me the secret with chillis is to treat them mean - don't water them till they're wilting, keep them potbound and don't feed them too much. That's another great thing about the floral marquees - you're talking direct to the experts, and they really know their stuff. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/purple_passions.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/purple_passions.html Sally Nex Fri, 11 Jul 2008 11:01:42 +0000 This year, though, they've really pushed the boat out. Not only is there the Growing Tastes marquee - don't miss the Isle of Wight Garlic stand, it's whiffy but spectacular - there's also a huge kitchen garden, dedicated to showing us just what wonders from around the world we can grow for the pot these days. I got Alessandra Valsecchi, of RHS Wisley, to show me around and pick out her favourite veg for a taste of British, Mediterranean and Oriental foodie heaven. "Potatoes," she says firmly, without much hesitation, when I ask her for the pick of the British crop. "You can't really go wrong with them. They're great for beginners, and they grow really easily." She picks out cabbages as the other quintessentially British veg - a little trickier as they suffer more pests and diseases, but they relish the damp climate ("this is cabbage weather," Alessandra comments about the relentless downpours this week). With spuds and cabbage as the British national veg, it's perhaps not surprising that we turn to foreign shores for a little excitement. The Mediterranean corner of the kitchen garden is undeniably more dramatic, with a gnarled fig tree centre stage, citrus and olives, and lots of brooding purple aubergines - which Alessandra picks out for her quintessential taste of the Med. "You still need to raise them under cover," she says, "though there are some varieties which do well outside - 'Bonica', 'Black Enorma' and 'Ghostbuster', for example. It's a bit like growing tomatoes - they need a lot of feeding but they're reasonably trouble-free." Finally, to the Orient, where soya beans, sweet potatoes and a pomegranate tree - all easily grown in the UK - look remarkably at home in their damp British setting. But the star of the East, according to Alessandra, is the loquat tree (Eriobotrya japonica): with its exotic-looking evergreen glossy leaves, it lends a lush, tropical look to your garden, yet it's reliably hardy and will even fruit in the UK. "You can plant it straight into the ground, just like any tree, so long as it has a sheltered position," advises Alessandra. "They can cope with a reasonable amount of frost - we've been growing them for some time in the north of Italy, and our winters are much tougher. We have frost for months on end, but they still crop, no problem at all." It's all a taste of things to come. "Things are much easier to get hold of now, and the culture is changing," says Alessandra. "We're a little bit more adventurous with our food, and with climate change it's making certain kinds of crop easier to grow." British veg gardens will never be the same again. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/veg_for_every_style_of_cuisine.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/veg_for_every_style_of_cuisine.html Sally Nex Wed, 09 Jul 2008 18:27:26 +0000 And if that's not enough, the Met Office has set up another tent next door, where you can try your hand at being a weather forecaster (though all the "forecasters" on this telly station were dripping slightly and wore definitely un-glamorous macs - I wonder if it'll catch on?) Ominously, the projected weather forecast for 2080 puts summer temperatures at 40°C in the south of England. "It's not that every summer will be hotter than the last one," Dr Chris Prior, former head of horticultural science at RHS Wisley, explained to me. "We can have one or two wet summers, and the trend is still there." Dr Prior thinks that it won't be easy for gardeners, but with longer growing seasons in prospect it's not all bad news. "Generally as the climate gets warmer, the opportunities are there to grow a wider range of plants," he says. Water saving, and on the other hand coping with wet winters by raising beds and improving drainage, are top of Dr Prior's tips for helping your garden to keep pace with the change. Another RHS guru on gardening through climate change, Matthew Wilson, agrees, and adds that the gardener's mantra, "right plant, right place" is never more crucial than when you're gardening with a changing climate. In fact, he says, if you get that right and look after your soil, the rest follows naturally. "My own garden gets the bare minimum of care - it's the horticultural equivalent of the plumber's dripping tap," he says. "But visitors say it looks lovely because I've used the right plants. So don't despair, it's absolutely possible to have a lovely garden that's sustainable too." ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/climate_change_is_on_the_agend.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/climate_change_is_on_the_agend.html Sally Nex Wed, 09 Jul 2008 14:02:54 +0000 'Dorset Cereals Edible Playground', by Nick Williams-Ellis, rather more often than perhaps I had to. This was another of my tips for the top - so I was delighted to see Nick and his team got a Gold medal and Best in Show There was an ominous black cloud looming over the garden as I began one of my interviews, so we opted for the shelter of the potting shed - beautifully crafted from Dorset oak and a central feature of the garden. The inside of this humble little shed is quite as exquisite as the garden itself. One wall of the shed was plastered with colourful pictures of vegetables, drawn by local primary school children. On the other wall was a display of antique gardening tools with a notice: "These are tools our grannies and grandpas used". On the table was not only a pile of compost and half-filled pot, but a few seedlings ready to go out in the garden. Nick is inviting everyone who visits the show to walk right through the garden and peek into this little child-sized bolthole. "This is about creating intimate spaces," he told me, "and you can't do that if you keep everyone outside looking in." And intimate it certainly is - this is a truly unpretentious garden, and entirely believable. You just wish you could take it home with you. The team had a few problems with the weather - a black plastic bag put over the scarecrow's head took most of her face off too when it was removed, so they had to do a quick rummage in make-up bags to restore her to her former glory. But they've come through to create a beautiful and entirely unpretentious space. And you should see the size of those strawberries. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/and_the_winner_is.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/and_the_winner_is.html Sally Nex Tue, 08 Jul 2008 10:42:01 +0000 Sometimes it doesn't come off - 'Pulsations', an odyssey in black polystyrene and cactus plants, is a highly unusual small garden, but it didn't do much for me. Other times, it's revolutionary: everyone's talking about ''The Porsche Garden' by Sim Flemons and John Warland, which solves the problem of using front gardens as car parks by the simple expedient of using a lift to park the car under the garden, not on it. It's undeniably a garden for the boys, but you can't help thinking ideas like that might just catch on one day. A few years ago the RHS recognised the show's tendency to break new ground by introducing the Conceptual Gardens category, and it's become a firm favourite - you always see something original, thought-provoking or both. You might understandably argue that 'Ecstasy in a Very Black Box' isn't really a garden at all: the only plants in it, after all, are tiny lettuces in a carpet across a black floor. But before you dismiss it, look closer: this is gardening as art, a visual representation of what it's like to suffer bipolar disorder. And when you understand it, you realise it's just right: glimpses of vivid brilliance - shards of coloured glass which of course harm as much as they attract - appearing tantalisingly through otherwise unremitting blackness. More cheerfully, my favourite of the conceptual gardens has to be Forest², created by Ivan Tucker with the help of horticultural students at Merrist Wood, near Guildford. With just 30 trees and some clever use of mirrors, an entire birch forest springs up in an unfeasibly small corner of the showground. I had great fun peeking through the portholes in the side - the best way to view this garden without spotting your own reflection in the background. Though it was disconcerting to see a disembodied head floating in the nether regions of the woods - and realise it was your own face looking back at you... ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/conceptual_garden_classics.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/conceptual_garden_classics.html Sally Nex Mon, 07 Jul 2008 18:32:31 +0000 Hampton Court Flower Show. They're tucked up nice and warm - and, more importantly, dry - in the floral marquees, while the show garden crews are barefoot, having given up even on wellies, and sodden. There are some advantages to a wet day at Hampton Court. This is the weather for showing off subtly-toned stone - the golden paving in 'Branching Out with Copella' was gleaming, setting off the gorgeous planting perfectly. This is one of my tips for Best in Show: designer Sadie May Stowell may be a first-timer but she's pulled off a real gem here. She picks up the rusty tones of perfectly-judged rusted-metal sculpture in sumptuous bronze, purple and orange planting, lightening the sultry tones with just the right amount of white from cow parsley-like Ammi majus and argyranthemums. The judges have already done their rounds and are no doubt making those all-important decisions as I write - but this one's bound to be a winner. Gnarled wood also looks brooding and ancient in the rain, dripping with moisture and just as it should look. Designer Francesca Cleary must be delighted - her 'Magic Garden' has a sinuous wall of interlocking tree roots, and with harts-tongue ferns literally dripping from its crevices it's straight out of the Lord of the Rings. For all the talk of global warming, this is good traditional British weather - and if a garden can look good in this, it can look good anywhere. Still, I found myself spending more time in the marquees than usual, which was no hardship. Amid frantic banging and the whine of screwdrivers - there's just a few hours to finish up now and last-minute panic has set in - the floral marquees are emerging in all their finery. The Plant Heritage marquee is for plantaholics everywhere: however well you know your plants there's always something new. Did you know, for example, that there are cannas you can grow in a pond? Nope - nor did I, but the NCCPG has a tub full of them to prove it. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/first_stop_the_floral_marquee.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/07/first_stop_the_floral_marquee.html Sally Nex Mon, 07 Jul 2008 11:42:15 +0000 One of my favourite moments on the last day of the Chelsea Flower Show is when the People's Award for Best Small Show Garden is presented. Alan Titchmarsh leads the way through the crowds and - to the surprise of the visitors who happen to be in front of the winning garden at the time - presents a rather snazzy trophy to the delighted designers. It's a great way to give these talented people some of the recognition they so richly deserve. This year the award went to the delightful Shetland Croft House Garden, one of the tiny courtyard gardens designed for the Motor Neurone Disease charity by Sue Hayward and Martin Anderson. Sue - who's never designed a show garden at Chelsea before - told me she was overwhelmed: "It almost means more than the gold medal," she said. "You almost forget that people are going to look at it in the end - the fact that we've had that reaction as well is brilliant." The small gardens are little microcosms of what Chelsea is all about. There's tremendous camaraderie among designers, especially along the Serpentine Walk where the Courtyard Gardens are, a little removed from the hustle and bustle of Main Avenue. Sue told me the patch of turf lining a ditch was given to them by a neighbour after they arrived without any: they planted it up with cowslips and orchids and it looks as natural as any wild grassland. The tiny size of these gardens means designers really have to pack in the detail. Sometimes it's so intricate you can overlook real gems: it took Sue to point out to me that what looks like quite a nice flower in a pot on the step of the croft is in fact Cerastium nigrescens, the Shetland Mouse-ear, which grows nowhere else in the world. I must have taken a good look at this garden half a dozen times this week: but not once did I give the rarest plant in the world so much as a glance. Just when you think you know Chelsea, it turns round and amazes you all over again. Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/small_gardens_peoples_award.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/small_gardens_peoples_award.html Sally Nex Sat, 24 May 2008 14:41:24 +0000 People's Award is all about. You can express your own opinion - for or against the judges' decisions - by putting in a vote for your favourites. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/thats_what_the_peoples_award_i.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/thats_what_the_peoples_award_i.html Sally Nex Thu, 22 May 2008 17:54:44 +0000 Adam Frost, another gold medal winner who also won Best Small Garden, told me he had to take himself off around the showground on a walk this morning to convince himself he wasn't dreaming - if he came back and his medal was still there, he would know it was true. He invited me on to his exquisite little garden to take a closer look - a real privilege for us reporters, as you get to see the garden from an entirely different angle and notice all those extra details you'd otherwise miss. I got the chance to do the same thing with Tom Stuart-Smith on his subtle garden for Laurent-Perrier: it's one of those gardens where you see more, the more you look, and he gave me a master class on the use of foliage in design just by talking me through what he'd put in a single corner. I'd spotted him earlier taking snaps of his own garden, spotting invisible imperfections to put right later - in a show like this, such meticulous attention to detail at all times is what separates the outstanding from the merely very good indeed. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/its_the_early_bird_that_gets_t.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/its_the_early_bird_that_gets_t.html Sally Nex Tue, 20 May 2008 11:40:40 +0000 The champagne has been flowing, the cameras have been flashing - it's a tough job, but someone's got to do it. Glamour and Chelsea go hand in hand: today we had everything from racing driver Damon Hill driving George Harrison's red mini through the showground to launch 'A Garden for George', to actors Felicity Kendal and Patricia Routledge having their pictures taken in the Great Pavilion. Amid all the razzmatazz, a solemn group of be-hatted gentlemen clutching clipboards could be seen standing in the gardens, pointing things out to each other and talking animatedly. These were the judges, and their progress around the showground was watched as intently as that of any celebrity. I collared one judge after the decisions were made to find out how it had gone: "some very lengthy discussions" was his verdict, so the decision has clearly not been straightforward this year. Well - we'll find out what conclusion they came to tomorrow at 8am, when medals and the top prize of Best in Show are awarded. Now we all have to leave the showground ahead of Her Majesty the Queen's private visit. This is an old tradition in Chelsea week - but nonetheless nerve-wracking for the designers, some of whom will meet the Queen and maybe exchange a few words with her. Overheard near the small Courtyard gardens was an anxious discussion: "I've been told it's Ma'am, as in 'ham' - not Ma'am as in 'harm'." "Are you sure?" "Well, that's what I've been told..." The trials of being a Chelsea designer don't just stop at the garden gate, it seems. Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/its_a_tough_job_but_someones_g.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/its_a_tough_job_but_someones_g.html Sally Nex Mon, 19 May 2008 16:03:49 +0000 There are plenty of excuses to get out, after all: this is the day Chelsea is 'the' place to be, glittering with celebrities and simply oozing glamour. The Great Pavilion is right at the heart of the action: new plants will be launched by TV stars, and this year the entire British yachting team will be gracing the stand at Hilliers, who are aiming for their 63rd gold in a row this year. I'll be making a beeline for my favourite exhibitor's stands, as today they'll reveal their treasures for the first time. Top of the list is Avon Bulbs - I've never yet come away without a new must-have plant to add to my list. I'll also stop by Knoll Gardens to see their new Pennisetum, and the vividly tropical displays from the City of Durban, Grenada and the Cayman Islands. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/this_is_it.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/this_is_it.html Sally Nex Mon, 19 May 2008 08:36:19 +0000 Cleve West is going around looking remarkably chipper, and I noticed Tom Stuart Smith smiling serenely, looking supremely calm and in control (mind you, I don't think anyone's seen him otherwise). Others are in flat-out panic mode. The Flemings Trailfinders Australian Garden is frantic - with lots of intricately-planned hard landscaping, this year capturing the spirit of Australia in burnt ochre, it was always going to go up to the wire. You know you're at Chelsea, though, when you find yourself watching a muscle-bound Australian bloke, complete with wraparound shades, polishing a table to mirror-like perfection with a chamois leather. The finished gardens are emerging now, though, and everyone's trying to second-guess which are in line for medals - and of course Best-in-Show. Word is that this year will be a clash of the Titans, between Arabella Lennox-Boyd's understated masterpiece for the Daily Telegraph, and Tom Stuart Smith's assured performance next door. ]]> Sally Nex https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/buildup_news.html https://bbcstreaming.pages.dev/blogs/flowershows/2008/05/buildup_news.html Sally Nex Sun, 18 May 2008 12:58:36 +0000