Gardens Beyond the Drawing Board
Left to Right, seated Sarah Cook and Bunny Guinness; Standing, Charles Notcutt, Nicholas Newton, Stephen Miles and John Dyter
- Honouring the Brief
Wednesday 4 November 2009 - Trinity Park, Ipswich
Garden conference is talk of the town
Gardening was the talk of the town at Trinity Park, Ipswich, yesterday, (November 4) when three of the country's leading designers and landscape architects revealed some of their favourite gardening secrets and gave practical advise on how to maintain a garden to the standard it was created.
Suffolk garden designer and consultant Nicholas Newton, who inspired the theme for the conference entitled "Gardens Beyond the Drawing Board - Honouring the Brief," inspired the 300 delegates to identify the vital ingredient that their gardens require to make it more than the sum of its parts.
Former head gardener of Sissinghurst Sarah Cook shared with the audience planting instructions for garden design as laid down by Vita Sackville West in "The Garden at Sissinghurst Castle, Cranbrook, Kent" quoting:" There should be the strictest formality of design with the maximum informality of planting.."
Following lunch of locally sourced ingredients, landscape architect Bunny Guinness gave an illustrated talk sharing tips for disguising unsightly walls, screening off the neighbours, creating an interesting entrance and more inspiration.
"The day was an absolute sell out," said Hannah Woods from The Suffolk Agricultural Association, who organised the event. "There was an excellent buzz right from the start of the first speaker and everyone left feeling inspired. The day also fulfilled one of the Association's major objectives of promoting education, horticulture and allied industries."
Delegates had a chance to visit several exhibition stands to select their spring bulbs from Rose Cottage Plants and fruit trees and shrubs from Crown Nurseries, as well as admire terracotta and French style planters and see work by other landscape designers. The event was sponsored by Alitex, NFU Mutual - Ipswich and Suffolk Gardens Trust.
For information on future conferences, please contact Hannah Woods on 01473 707118.