RHS Round Up!

The RHS show was soon in full swing after a glorious spell of sunny weather, and Tatton’s garden team were in high spirits having been awarded a Silver Gilt for their entry ‘A flight of Fancy’.

Linking in with the Tatton Park Arts Biennial 2012, the imaginative concept behind the garden design is that the last Baron Egerton, who collected plants and garden styles from many continents, including the famous Japanese Garden, sent plant material to other countries, including pea and bean cultivators to his estate in Kenya. Combining  his passion for plants with his interests in exploration, early radio cars, and was a pioneer aviator it helped launch our concept for the 1930’s style rocket, landing on a desolate planet where 1000’s of seeds spill out onto the baron land and flourished into a mass of colour.

What went into the show...

The build took 2 weeks from start to finish, and much of the garden’s features were grown or recycled from Tatton’s own gardens including 3-4 tonnes of the rocks and boulders that make up the Moongate!

Since we started growing the plant species in early May we have nurtured them daily to ensure they are at their best for the show.

We have lots of varieties of plants and vegetables in the garden this year ...see if you can spot them! They include pineapple plants from Tatton’s very own Pineapple house! We also have bananas, cannas, runner beans and cucumbers – all from our conservatory, and palms from our fernery...

...We even have a small rock pool which represents life on the flourishing side of the garden.

Simon (far right) with Head gardener Simon Tetlow (centre) and Bob Buckley (far left)

By Simon Kellet, Garden Team member

If you visited the show this year we would love to hear your comments about your personal show highlights and your thoughts on Cheshire East’s exhibit by the Tatton Garden team.  Leave us your comments below!

For more info on Tatton Parks garden click here.

Late Flowering Season

Over the past few weeks I have also been working on the Italian Terrace parterre (see The Italian Job below!)

This week we have finally finished installing all the metalwork. The blacksmiths, Broadbents, came in for a couple of days to help us weld all the internal pieces into place. This was a really intricate job as each piece had to be welded in separately and then welded on to the next piece.

The next job is to fill the central metal sections with soil and compost ready for planting the Armeria, commonly known as ‘Thrift’. This is a pink flower often found on coastal areas and is also used on the lower Italian Terrace area. The next job will be to put ‘Mipex’ down; this is a sheet which keeps the soil and gravel separate – we’ll be starting this next week, ready for the 10 tonnes of gravel arriving shortly. This means all the hard structure will be ready for Easter and the red Geraniums and white Alyssum etc will then be planted early June. Normally I look after Charlotte’s Garden and the Rose Garden so it’s been great to work in a different area and in this project to reinstate a parterre.

We are unfortunately three weeks late with the bulbs this year, due to the icy and frosty weather. Normally by now we would have quite a lot of daffodils in the garden and none have appeared as yet! Also none of the camellias in Tower Wood (near the Tower Garden) have flowered yet - in the past, some may be half way through flowering by now. Camellias flower one flower on each branch at a time and then when that dies or is frosted, the next bloom will open. As yet, we’ve seen none!

In three weeks time, possibly around Easter if the weather stays nice we should get a real blaze of colour from the early Rhododendrons, daffodils, camellias, the Iris reticulata and Magnolias – so it’s definitely worth planning a visit around that time. (As a taster - here's an illustration from our archives - pics of Camellias in bloom to follow!)



Pete Lofthouse
Craftsman Gardener