Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2025 i Gardens Illustrated Magazine

April is upon us, and with the unpredictability of recent years, we wait with bated breath to see if it will indeed be 'the cruellest month'. Spring is becoming more of a guessing game, for gardeners and garden editors – will there be a heatwave, a polar vortex collapse or endless rain? Whatever happens, in this issue of the magazine we are in full, optimistic, spring mode, looking forward to everything the season has to offer. We visit Morton Hall in Worcestershire, where tulips take centre stage for the annual festival and light up the beds and borders in abundance (page 30). At Fittleworth House in West Sussex, we explore the romantic gardens that surround a Georgian house, which come into their own in spring (page 52). And we jet…

EXHIBITIONS A WOMAN'S WORK As a new book, Women Artists & Designers at the National Trust (National Trust, £15) shows, women have long been at the creative heart of many of Britain's best-known houses and gardens. To celebrate the book's publication, several National Trust properties are hosting exhibitions that showcase six centuries of women's art. Among the highlights is a new exhibition at Sissinghurst Castle in Kent that explores the life and work of its garden's famous creator, the author Vita Sackville-West. At Hidcote in Gloucestershire, there's a chance to discover the work of embroidery artist Janet Haigh, whose silk embroidery of the Peacock Garden at Great Dixter is shown above, while at Nunnington Hall in North Yorkshire, Threaded Landscapes brings together pieces by Nicola Harper, who recreates her urban,…

Earliest garden memory Making mud pies and playing with childhood friends in the uncut grass of our local park under the towering urban landscape. First plant love When my family moved to the Devon coast, the tubular bells of foxgloves called to me whenever I clambered down the rocky paths to go for chilly swims. My heart still leaps every time I see one. Who has inspired your career the most? For a time I worked alongside lead creative gardener Romany Taylor on a project called Cultivate Create. Together, we created an edible garden and ran art workshops with local families who didn't have access to gardens. Their joy and enthusiasm made me realise how vital it is we all connect with the land. Who are your horticultural heroes? Working…

Hardy perennials Perennial plants are often badly affected by slugs and snails, but the ones listed below are usually left alone, and offer a succession of flowers from late spring until autumn. 1 AQUILEGIAS Despite not having tough or hairy leaves, this stalwart of the early summer cottage garden isn't on the menu for molluscs. Aquilegias can be grown in sun or light shade but are prone to powdery mildew in dry soil. Striking cultivars include scarlet and yellow Aquilegia canadensis (shown left), or more classic choices such as maroon and white A. vulgaris 'William Guiness', pink A. vulgaris var. stellata 'Nora Barlow', dark-maroon A. vulgaris var. stellata 'Black Barlow' and A. chrysantha 'Yellow Queen'. 2 BERGENIAS The large, leathery leaves of bergenias don't endear themselves to every gardener, but…

This intimate courtyard garden in north London is surrounded by a six-floor apartment block, and built over a car park, requiring careful consideration of weight-loading. Access was also a challenge, and the client wanted privacy without reducing natural light into the apartment. While sunlight does reach the space, it is mostly dappled. The conditions made it well-suited to tree ferns, and their broad, arching fronds create a natural canopy, filtering views from the apartments above while maintaining a sense of airiness as the texture of them is so filigree. The dappled light they cast enhances intimacy without blocking light to the garden or apartment. To make the boundaries recede, we painted the mid-1990s yellow-brick perimeter walls a deep black-green, and added three large mirrors of black glass to the walls,…

Claire Austin Nurserywoman and peony expert Claire selects the best tree peonies, page 42. “It's wonderful to have the chance to introduce these beautiful and versatile plants to a wider audience.” Bennet Smith Bennet photographs Fittleworth House in West Sussex, page 52. “A cuckoo joining the dawn chorus as the sun rose behind the magnificent cedar of Lebanon intensified the magic of the place.” Natasha Goodfellow Natasha visits a London front garden, page 66. “'In an area where so many gardens are paved, this shows how much more interesting and wildlife-friendly they can be.”…

FROM 8 APRIL Show Stopping Event Floristry Save 25 per cent on a new online event floristry course from floral artist Willow Crossley. To redeem, just add the code WILLOW5 at checkout. £147 before discount. createacademy.com 13 APRIL Spring Fling Plant Fair Browse plants and accessories at Great Comp's springtime fair. 10am-5pm. £10. Great Comp Garden, Comp Lane, Platt, nr Sevenoaks, Kent TN15 8QS. Tel 01732 885094, greatcompgarden.co.uk 26 APRIL Foraging Floristry Workshop Create a design with foraged flowers. 10am-2.30pm. £70. One Garden Brighton, Stanmer Park, Lewes Road, Brighton, East Sussex BN1 9SE. Tel 01273 892034, onegardenbrighton.com…

Ilong for a red squirrel or a fawn, a pine martin or an otter. Even a hedgehog would be a delight. Some hope. Here in this small urban garden, I must content myself with what I have, or perhaps I should say, with what I can see. The woodpecker was early this year, jabbing away at a neighbour's towering sycamore from the last week in January. Same spot on the same tree trunk every year, but I don't know if it is the same bird; I only assume that it is. Perhaps I just want it to be the same bird. Whether it is marking its territory or extracting its lunch of insects from the bark, the furious hammering can be heard from one end of the terrace to the…

Design is everywhere. It is glorious, but exhausting,” says Andrew Duff, and it is a statement he lives by. For more than 30 years, he has designed gardens, taught students of garden design and travelled the world lecturing on garden design. He has also been on the council of the Society of Garden and Landscape Designers (SGLD) since 2018 and became its chair two years ago, so he doesn't get much time off for good behaviour; but then, he doesn't seem to want it. Look through his Instagram account and you will see that even there he plays design games, organising images in individual posts so that they join up on the grid to create a bigger picture. “Most designers are control freaks and perfectionists, but that is not really…

ELEGANT STYLE Provence Vintage Bistro Set, Bath stone, £249, Agriframes, 0117 934 1790, agriframes.co.uk ART DECO LOOK Groove Obround Table, moss (chairs and stools sold separately), £1,160, Tom Dixon, tomdixon.net ANTIQUE FINISH Southwold 3 Seater Bench with Back, £1,125, Harrod Horticultural, 0333 400 1500, harrodhorticultural.com HIGH SPIRITS HAY Palissade Bar Stool (table sold separately), olive green, £365 each, Holloways of Ludlow, 020 7602 5757, hollowaysofludlow.com MARBLE MARVEL Baxter Matera Marble Garden Table, £10,560, Monologue, 020 7729 0400, monologuelondon.com QUICK-DRY FOAM Palma 6 Seat Rope Oval Dining Set, grey, £2,499, Harbour Lifestyle, 0330 808 1744, harbourlifestyle.co.uk TERRACE TABLE Tånebro Indoor/Outdoor Side Table, dark green, £15, IKEA, ikea.com/gb/en OUTDOOR FABRIC Eve Grande Corner Sofa Group, £5,599, Maze Living, 01440 710673, mazeliving.co.uk GALVANISED STEEL Sudbury Dining Table (chairs and cushions sold separately), £1,698,…

CRAFTING WITH FLOWERS by Bex Partridge Hardie Grant, £16.99 ISBN 978-1784887810 Using fresh and dried flowers, along with foraged finds, Bex guides you through a range of gorgeous projects that will bring you closer to the natural world. She also offers her thoughts on the art of noticing and appreciating the natural wonders of each season. NETTLES & PETALS by Jamie Walton Leaping Hare, £16.99 ISBN 978-1836001393 A comprehensive guide to wild gardening, including advice on foraging and seed-saving as well as identifying edible weeds and wild plants. Part practical guide, part educational plant lore, this book has everything to start your journey towards more sustainable and conscious green-living. BIG GARDEN DESIGN by Paul Bangay Thames & Hudson, £45 ISBN 978-1760763299 Landscape designer Paul Bangay relishes the challenge of working…

Hot on the heels of its open-access Database of Pollinator Interactions (DoPI), the University of Sussex has published the results of a new project that links the use of fertilisers to agricultural productivity and the decline in our wildflowers and pollinators. Although it's very much a work in progress, it has already thrown up some surprises. For example, who would have guessed that creeping buttercup would turn out to have to highest number of pollinator species (240) of any of our wildflowers? The newer study combines flower and pollinator abundance with soil-nutrient data at the world's longest running ecological experiment, Park Grass at Rothamsted Research. The finding that high agricultural productivity means low pollinator abundance (and, conversely, lower productivity equals more pollinators) has presented farmers as well as conservationists and…

Charlotte Harris Charlotte co-founded the values-driven landscape design practice Harris Bugg Studio with Hugo Bugg in 2017. She has won three Gold medals at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, as well as Best Show Garden in 2023. Fergus Garrett Fergus was appointed head gardener at Great Dixter by Christopher Lloyd in 1993 and is now CEO of the garden's Charitable Trust. He was awarded an RHS Associate of Honour in 2008 and an RHS Victoria Medal of Honour in 2019. James Basson James lives in the South of France where he runs Scape Design, a practice for creating sustainable landscapes. The winner of four Chelsea Gold medals, he was awarded Best Show Garden in 2017. Anna Pavord Anna was The Independent's gardening correspondent for 30 years and is the author…

TULIPA ORPHANIDEA WHITTALLII GROUP This diminutive tulip is thoroughly perennial given an open position with plenty of spring sunshine and summer baking. Discreet basal foliage throws a fine stem topped by onion-shaped buds, which open into cupped flowers that are yellow without and burnt orange within. When they splay open, an inky-green blotch is revealed at the base. Its punchy colouring makes a vivid presence, unusual in spring. At Hillside, we team it with acid-green Euphorbia cyparissias 'Fens Ruby'. AGM*. Height and spread 20cm × 15cm. Origin Eastern Balkans, Greece and western Turkey. Conditions Free-draining soil; full sun. Hardiness RHS H6, USDA 4a-8b†. Season of interest April – May. EPIMEDIUM MYRIANTHUM Chinese epimediums are particular about a cool position, shelter from wind and not drying out during the growing season. While European epimediums are…

FACT FILE What The shrubby form of the genus Paeonia, also known as woody peonies. Season Flowers in spring. Size Most reach around 1.2m tall. Conditions Well-drained soil. They do well in clay as long as it does not stay wet all year. Although they prefer sun, they can cope with shade for a short period of the day. Origins Mountains of central and western China. Hardiness Hardy throughout most of the UK with an RHS hardiness rating of H5-H6 and suitable for gardens in USDA zones 4a to 8b. *Holds an Award of Garden Merit from the Royal Horticultural Society. †Hardiness ratings given where available. Tree peonies, also known as woody peonies, are the shrubby form of the glamorous genus Paeonia. During May, the woody stems produce one or two flower buds that swell…

If I can get people to look more closely at nature and their environment, then my hope is that they might start to take more care of it When artist Nick McMillen is drawing, very little can distract him. “I'm oblivious to everything around me,” he says. “It's as if I lose consciousness and then three or four hours later, I come to and realise I've completed another section.” Looking at his finished works – intricate studies of sycamore keys, lichens or of the winter skeletons of trees – it's easy to see how he could become so absorbed: the detail is extraordinary. “I try to draw them as I would a portrait of a person,” he says, “to elevate them on some level. I think they're amazing things that…

The idea of growing vegetables with no mulching, netting, slug pellets or hoeing might seem like an impossible dream. A dream in which we also want to grow our food as part of a complex and diverse ecosystem that will help build and protect biodiversity; where a vegetable garden looks more like a beautiful wilderness full of food and flowering weeds. One where you find hedgehogs hiding under cabbages or snakes sunbathing on hay-mulched beds, constantly surrounded by an orchestra of insects and birds from dawn to dusk. Natural farming, I hope, is how we fulfil this dream, and it is something we've been experimenting with at Birch Farm, which for the past five years has supplied fresh produce for the kitchens at the Farmers Arms pub and other projects…