I’ve been quite busy with designing and planting over the last few months, which is always good and brings an opportunity to look back at the garden visit archives here on the blog and to update some of them with new photos. Yet again I am adding and re-adding to the list of gardens to…
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The joy of a Qualified Gardener
Reading this article (below) had me nodding and agreeing in the most part. I come up against the same issue time and again, in the occasional garden that I am asked to manage and in ensuring that gardens I have designed, once built develop as the client expects and reach their full potential. http://www.theoutdoorcooperative.com/design/advice-using-a-qualified-horticulturist/ Gardens…
Continue ReadingGrowing a Cutting Garden – WK4 Arranging
On paper, having grown enough flowers to fill several small shops we now need to know what to do with them. This for me has always been one of the hardest jobs, I love flowers and the house is full of bunches through spring and summer but artfully arranging them?, well that’s quite another thing….
Continue ReadingGrowing a Cutting Garden – WK3 Maintenance
The most challenging week of the course so far. Maintenance and planning are crucial to this type of gardening. Miss a sowing period and in some cases you’ve had it for that year. Interesting to find out that most of us start too early, I am guilty of this in my enthusiasm to get going…
Continue ReadingGrowing a Cutting Garden – WK2 Plant Palettes
I had forgotten how much time these information packed courses demand if one is to make the absolute most of the teacher and their time. Unplanned interruptions for me in week 2 made it a rush to complete in the given timescale, although Charlie is so charming going over a few days wouldn’t be a…
Continue ReadingGrowing a Cutting Garden – WK1 Planning
Week one of the The Cutting Garden course from My-Garden-School went well. I find I am working for myself, out on a freezing morning surveying my current plots. Being a designer is a bit like being the cobblers children (no shoes!). You almost never have time to plan, in entirety, your own plot. Sections yes…
Continue ReadingCut Flower gardening
Keeping to the ‘Slight Edge‘ approach, continual study, expansion of personal experience and knowledge is vital as a designer. This January I’ve been asked to follow, and blog about, another great course from the My Garden School Team Growing a Cutting Garden. I experimented a good deal last year with a dedicated patch for growing…
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