Certainly one of the highpoints of my year was working on a show garden at Chelsea Flower Show. I was contracted in to work for Steve Swatton, the landscaper in charge of Cleve West's Brewin Dolpin garden. My work colleague Max Nowell and I were responsible for all the stone work in the garden. Cleve West's garden won Best in Show in 2011 but no garden designer had ever won this two years running. The gardens must all be built within 2 weeks so work starts at 7 in the morning when the site opens and finishes at 8pm. This year was especially difficult for most folk as it rained almost continually but this gave us an advantage as I've worked in the rain for most of my life.
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| Me on the trestle, looking over the wall |
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| Wetter than the Lake District |
The stone we were using was limestone from Gloucester which was easy to work and looked beautiful in the walls. We built 2 pillars for gateposts, 4 side pillars, some interior walls and the big stone feature which was an old stone well head mounted on steelwork to look like it was hanging in front of the wall. After 10 manic days we knew we were on track to complete the garden on time which took some of the pressure off and I was on my way home after 14 days, a few days before the show opened. My family, who have never seen a flower show before spent hours watching footage of Chelsea 2012 and on the second day, the medals were announced. Our garden won a Gold Medal and Best in Show! My mum was very proud and told everyone that 'my' garden had won. The experience was wonderful and Cleve West was a really nice straighforward man, a real joy to work for and his gardens are beautiful.
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| The winning garden |
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