Greenforks » Garden Visits

Wordless Wednesday – Anticipation

easygardener — Wed, 16 May 2012 08:23:16 +0000

Tickets to the Chelsea Flower Show

For more Wordless Wednesday posts visit here.

Blooming Friday – Soft and Hard

easygardener — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 10:29:40 +0000

Welcome to Blooming Friday where we are looking at soft and hard.

Here is a picture from the Chelsea Flower Show. This was part of “A Modern Rock Garden” where grass and succulents were planted against a background of small black stones.

Chelsea Flower Show 2009 - The Modern Rock Garden

At the ArtDeJardin Sculpture Garden a metallic sculpture is surrounded by grass and foliage.

Allium

Finally – a soft furry black cat on a hard wooden shelf!

Halki asleep

Visit Katarina at Roses and Stuff to see more Blooming Friday contributions.

Blooming Friday – Old fashioned

easygardener — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 09:45:16 +0000

Now that I have got my internet connection working I can once again produce a post for Blooming Friday.

Primula auricula is a flower that I always think of as old fashioned. They came to this country from Europe in the 16th Century. There have been flower shows for Auriculas since the 17th Century and The National Auricula Society was founded in 1872-73. A craze swept the country and they became very popular, grown by all levels of society, rich or poor.

Auriculas at the Chelsea Flower Show 2009

When I was a child this flower was grown in all the local gardens. They have now fallen out of favour but I rather admire their bright colours and their refusal to unbend and look more casual.

Lupins at the Chelsea Flower Show 2009

I will finish with an old fashioned method of transport I saw in Belgium.

Ghent Flower Show 2010

Visit Katarina at Roses and Stuff to see more Blooming Friday contributions.

Blooming Friday – Fanciful

easygardener — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 10:12:06 +0000

My interpretation of fanciful is something imaginary and whimsical. What better to illustrate this than a display I saw at the Chelsea Flower Show last year. I loved the bright colours and the exuberance of it all.

It was called “Fantastic Thailand” and was designed by Thailand’s Nong Nooch Tropical Botanic Garden. Each sculpture is covered with flowers individually hand-crafted from petals and leaves. They must have used thousands of them over the whole display. It was awarded a Gold Medal and certainly deserved it.

Fantastic Thailand

Dragons

Elephants

Visit Katarina at Roses and Stuff to see more Blooming Friday contributions.

Blooming Friday – Centrepiece

easygardener — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 09:18:02 +0000

Welcome to Blooming Friday where we are looking at centrepieces.

Here is a metal sculpture which stands in the centre of a grass lawn. It is in the garden of a manor house which I visited last year.

Sculpture at Chenies Manor

Every year the glass house at Wisley garden has a Butterfly event where butterflies are allowed to fly amongst the Tropical plants growing there. It is an amazing sight and a chance to see these beautiful butterflies up close. I took a picture of this one as it rested in the centre of a plate of fruit.

Owl Butterfly

The wildlife in my garden is less exotic. At present he centre of my bird table is always occupied by Pigeons….Pigeons….Pigeons. All the food disappears in an instant.

Pigeons on the bird table

Visit Katarina at Roses and Stuff to see more Blooming Friday contributions.

Blooming Friday – Mouthwatering

easygardener — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 07:24:18 +0000

Welcome to Blooming Friday. Here are a few things I find mouthwatering. First is my favourite tomato, which has the best taste ever.

Tomato 'Sungold'

Fruit you can pick for free in the wild.

Blackberries

Freshly baked goodies.

Flapjack

And best of all…a wonderful garden to view…

Beth Chatto Garden

…which also has a nursery full of mouthwatering plants :-)

Nursery at the Beth Chatto Garden

All are very hard to resist!

Visit Katarina at Roses and Stuff to see more Blooming Friday contributions.

Wordless Wednesday – Sculpture at Burghley House

easygardener — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 09:09:36 +0000

Burghley House

'Vertical Face' by Rick Kirby

'Held' by Anna Gillespie

For more Wordless Wednesday posts visit here.

Blooming Friday – Fanciful

easygardener — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 10:13:26 +0000

Welcome to Blooming Friday. Here are a few of the fanciful or whimsical things I have seen during my visits to various gardens.

Wildlife Tower (Chelsea Flower Show)

Allium seed head (Artdejardin sculpture garden)

Hungry Crocodile (Flaxbourne Farm)

The Illuminator by Tach Pollard (Pashley Manor)

Monkey Puzzle Tree (Araucaria auracana) at Plant World

For more Blooming Friday posts visit Katarina at Roses and Stuff.

Have a good weekend.

Wordless Wednesday – Mirror

easygardener — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 07:53:48 +0000

Mill Dene Garden, Gloucestershire

For more Wordless Wednesday posts visit here.

Malvern Spring Show – where virtual bloggers become a reality

easygardener — Tue, 11 May 2010 10:35:12 +0000

The Digger and I enjoyed our trip to the Malvern Spring Show where a garden bloggers’ get together took place. It was fascinating to meet people who I had virtually “known” for over a year and others who I had never met before. It was especially lovely meeting Frances, Gail, Yolanda and Ewa who came over from the USA, Netherlands and Poland.

It was our first visit to the show and we enjoyed it immensely. There were lots of plants and garden sundries to buy. Everyone was walking around with full bags and trolleys.

Happy shoppers

I saw these carved wood garden seats and loved them. I decided we could squeeze one single chair into the back of the car, though it did take a while to manoeuvre it in !

I must have one of those!

Best of all were the show gardens. They are always interesting to look at whether you like them or not. There is always a chance there will be some feature or planting I can use in my own garden. I would love to have the log arch in the third picture below.

The Inside Out Garden

The Wisdom & Youth Garden

The Owl & The Pussycat Garden

The Resource Garden

There were plants of course and many were for sale. I was quite restrained and only bought nine plants in total including three species Pelargoniums. These Alliums and Echium pininana caught my eye in one of the show gardens.

Alliums and Echiums

There was also entertainment at the Show as you can see. Cleve West, James Alexander-Sinclair and Joe Swift demonstrate their dancing skills. The lengths some people will go to to get a round of applause!

Three Men Went To Mow - step 1

Three Men Went To Mow - step 2

Many thanks to VP and The Patient Gardener for organising this very entertaining weekend.