Canal & River Trust: Message in a Bottle garden at RHS Hampton Court Palace Flower Show.
INTERVIEW
Built by First Light Landscaping, designed by Tracy Foster.
THE RETURN TO OUTDOOR EVENTS Summer is here, the sun is shining – and, finally, it seems that things are getting back to normal again.
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fter a year of uncertainty, staying indoors and cancelled or virtual events, it has been a joy for us to be back on the road again, visiting all the best mainstays of the landscaping and gardening events circuit. From the Royal Horticultural Society’s show-stopping gardens to the grand surroundings of Belvoir Castle’s Flower and Garden Show, awards events and trade shows, everything we missed last year is making a big comeback.
Our own Association has had the privilege of attending several events including RHS Hampton Court Festival, where our members won big with several Gold and Silver medals, Best Construction Awards and even a Best Show Garden for Rosebank Landscaping’s The Cancer Research UK Legacy Garden, and Belvoir Castle Flower & Garden Show, where we presented a show garden for the very first time, in conjunction with Oakham Garden Services and our careers initiative GoLandscape.
Though the virtual shows of last year all managed spectacular things under challenging circumstances, it has been an enormous pleasure to get back out on the road, meeting landscape professionals and members in the field and seeing their creativity flourish as they return to what they do best: making beautiful gardens.
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LANDSCAPE NEWS AUTUMN 2021
We talked to some of our members about their experiences with this year’s events season, the pandemic, and how it feels to be back out in the sunshine.
How has the events season been for you this year?
Oakham Garden Services With the UK starting to open up, it enables lots of designers and landscapers to have that well-earned exposure, to demonstrate their talent. So far, we have only attended Belvoir Castle Flower & Garden Show although we are keen to attend more shows in the near future simply because we thoroughly enjoyed the experience and was very grateful of the support the Association provided. FirstLight Landscaping We were able to work at the RHS Hampton Court Garden Festival in July 2021, which had been postponed from 2020, so it was great to finally get down there to start the construction and attend the event after so many months of planning. We also attended the ProLandscaper Business Awards in London last month, where we were shortlisted for an award. Rosebank Landscaping It was great to be at RHS Hampton Court Festival this year. We’ve done two show gardens at RHS Chelsea Flower Show before and were due to do a fifth RHS garden at Chelsea. Unfortunately, due to the movement
By Emily Magdij Marketing & Communications Officer
of the date, from summer to autumn, we had to skip the event this year. We were due to build a garden at Chelsea with the Royal Army Medical Corps, but fortunately we were able to build it straight at the hospital, so it didn’t go to waste.
We had a brilliant time at RHS Hampton Court Festival – in our first year there, we started with winning a Gold medal, then progressed with our next garden to winning a Gold medal and Best Construction, then to a clean sweep of the awards with our garden in conjunction with Cancer Research UK this year. Lee Bestall I’ve had a great time taking part in online events as well as in-person events. I’ve taken part in lots of online events from one hour talks hosted by other Committees - I’d never consider travelling from Sheffield to London for an hour usually - to a full on two day seminar over Zoom. How they held my attention from 9am till 8pm for two days I’ll never know, but they did!
How are you finding the return?
Oakham Garden Services We’re finding it all a bit overwhelming if anything, but in a positive way. We have so much available to us now there are more events, shows and things to attend. With project commitments we understand that as nice as it would
