Gold Medal At Hampton Court

I was over the moon to be awarded a gold medal for my Conceptual garden at Hampton Court Palace Flower show.

I want to say a huge thank you to my main contributors - the RHS, Benchmarx joinery and Pantiles nursery, without whom this garden would not have been realised to it's full potential.

Also, to my fantastic builders - John-William, who led the project, and his dad Bill who worked incredibly hard to get the garden finished in 18 days.

I've had some really great comments and articles about the garden - especially in The Independent. I also found a YouTube clip thanks to Contextual gardens.

Hampton Court Palace Flower Show

I'm building a conceptual garden, Picturesque, at Hampton Court Palace Flower Show this year - 26 days to go and I'm feeling like I'm on adrenaline fueled auto-pilot! The show's from the 5th-10th July for anyone thinking of visiting.

Conceptual gardens are about ideas and I'm hoping to provoke thoughts and inspire but mostly to create a space where people will enjoy being.

I'm building an out door art gallery where pieces of art, inspired by some of the worlds greatest artists, will be composed of plants. The idea originated from wanting to create 'views' out of a small space - something that I believe is an important part of my job as a garden designer. It slowly evolved as I began looking at framing views, galleries and then on to looking at how artists interpret nature.

So my artists are chosen: Monet, Hockney, Rousseau, Kandinsky, Mondrian and Hirst. Planting compositions range from Water lilies to Jungle plants to Air Plants - the latter only needing the air around them to survive and hence are part of my Hirst creation where they will be suspended - as if in Formaldehyde - in a glass tank. In my head it all works - I just hope the real thing works in practice.

I start building in 8 days time so lists and schedules are abundant as is paint, wood, sculptures, a pond and plants to look after.

Although the category of Conceptual Garden at Hampton Court is Sponsored by the RHS - a huge thank you has to go out to my additional contributors - Benchmarx Kitchens and Joinery for all the materials they have given me and Pantiles Nursery for lending me some of their superb quality plants.

The Show is Over....

The RHS London Plant and Design Show is now over and I am very happy to have a relaxing day at home, catching up on a few jobs and not having 16 hour days...as they have been for the last 5 days.

I was awarded a Silver-Gilt medal - a step up from my Silver last year - so heading in the right direction - but God...I would have liked a gold! I didn't feel so bad about feeling this way after chatting to Tony Smith - who, having 5 Gold medals to his name and a few silver-gilts, told me that you're never really happy unless you get a gold...that's just the way it is!

I am now starting to plan for my conceptual garden at Hampton Court Palace Flower Show this summer and getting back to work as normal with some exciting new design projects.

Pre-build....

It's about now that the pressure of a show garden really builds...everything is being delivered over the next few days - artwork came yesterday, leaflets arrived today, planters and furniture arrive tomorrow - so it's all go and the adrenaline has started to work it's magic - in that I seem to be able to survive on very little sleep!

My plants have arrived as well which is very exciting - for the middle of February I think they're looking pretty good. The frost has got to a few of them, so I have been meticulously snipping off each and every damaged leaf...a therapeutic process but one that does produce the occasional... "Why, on earth, I am doing this?"

I had a call from my furniture suppliers today and there has been a mistake with the delivery...not the best news I had all day, as the manufacturers are in Denmark. After establishing that it was pretty improbable that we could get the correct piece of furniture here on time, I have realised that I will have to work with what I have. I'm giving a talk on Show Garden Building at an RHS seminar on Wednesday (yes...the same day as the show is on, nothing like piling on the work load) - and I have included in my talk a section on the fact that mistakes happen and you just have to solve the problem the best way possible. So, I am adamant not to get stressed about it.

We have started to construct the garden so that all is ready for the 2 and a half day build that starts on Saturday. Here is John-William, my trusty builder, steadily cutting the porcelain tiles - not an easy job.

I'm having an evening off tonight and heading up to Oxford to listen to the eminent Landscape Architect Martha Schwartz, and to catch up with some of my college friends who I haven't seen for ages - can't wait.

Judgement Day

Woke up at 4.30am this morning....very annoying

Cleaned up the site and then cleared off for a much needed shower and coffee whilst the judges were on site...

Pre-shower

Earlier on in the week I received the very prestigious Golden Gnome award for wearing a short skirt on site....(and making Hi-Vis site wear look glam) I am very proud! Hope Health and Safety don't get wind of this - had had enough of steel toe caps this morning...;{

Post shower/ coffee/ make up and after receiving Silver medal from the RHS...(Gold next time....did I say there wouldn't be a next time???)

Thank you for reading this - look forward to seeing people at the show over the rest of the week, lots of Pimms and Champagne to be drunk.

I need bees....

I had some great advice recently - I need to self pollinate my strawberries as they are in a polytunnel and the cold weather means bees are scarce....Great - as if I didn't have enough to do. So out I went with a little paint brush to brush pollen from flower to flower. Easier said than done - pollen may be small but I was expecting my paint brush to come away from each flower bulging with pollen as the bees legs do....it didn't happen - evolution did a good job at making bees legs magnificent pollen catchers.

Shortly after I spotted a bee in the garden and thought maybe I could catch it so I could place it gently on a flower in the polytunnel - I failed in this first attempt but will keep on trying otherwise I run the risk of irregular shaped starwberries... heaven forbid...I've heard the RHS are hard task masters - I need perfect berries.

I spent some of my University days studying honey bees in Portugal looking at their tendencies to be right or left handed - I can't quite remember the results but I have fond memories of lying in fields of lavender watching bees and have had a soft spot for them ever since. I have just bought a 'bee box' for the garden - got to look out for these important little creatures. See the Plight of the Honey Bee.