THE MODERN MINT BLOG
10 Years Of Modern Mint
On Valentine’s day this year (2024) Modern Mint, the company I started when I moved to Essex to explore a fresh, contemporary approach to gardening, will be 10 years old.
The cliche is time flies… but it does! So much has happened in a decade, from studying topiary with Charlotte Molesworth, to clipping all over the UK (and eventually in the USA and Sweden) to selling shears and secateurs at garden shows and hiding away my reticence to give talks about gardening and topiary to Horticultural Societies across the UK.
Ten years feels a good time to mark a new change.
We have just moved to Whitby on the North Yorkshire coast (after an exhausting search and process to find a home) and so this year I will be focusing on the following for Modern Mint:
- Share the Craft of Topiary – pruning method, plants to use, tools you need, skills to shape plants or clip with to a perfect facade… sharing all the stuff people need to know.
- Exploring the Art of Topiary – the use of abstract techniques to generate form, composition of a view, discovering narrative from the study of a landscape… the intangible parts of topiary and design that begets the joy in life, but is harder to measure or quantify.
Now, the one element topiary always needs is time. Ten years of Modern Mint – and topiary is a commitment on this scale too. Look at these pines I have just planted in the garden at our new place in Whitby…
Tiny and a little inconsequential… right now…. but time is needed for them to become the characters they will become.
And what about these yews? Cut back hard 50 years ago. Just bare sticks…
But look at them now!
Extraordinary to look at (and to work on every summer, of course! You can see more shots of this clipping I do here in a short video…)
So ten years has passed since I started Modern Mint. I heard a phrase recently – you overestimate how much you can do in a year, but underestimate how much you can achieve in a decade – looking at the ten years that have passed so fast, that feels true… but I can see the life spent is something to celebrate… from here on the Yorkshire coast.
And for more on how I will share the Craft of Topiary in 2024, visit the Teaching page.
Modern Topiary, the Book, at Garden Media Guild
My book about topiary, Modern Topiary, has been mentioned on the Garden Media Guild newsletter…. As the screenshot says, the book can be read for free online here. At the bottom of the screenshot, it looks like another Garden Media Guild member has a book out called ‘A Year In A Cottage Garden’…. so if that is where your garden heart lies, check that out too! And at the top of the screenshot, it looks like I was listening to Pelleas et Melisande, by Debussy. What a classy chap I am, listening to classical music as I reply to emails. …
Start of the Whitby Topiary Library
I have been offered a space here in the centre of Whitby, south-facing aspect, with some raised beds in, so that I can make a Topiary Library. In my head, a topiary library is a place to showcase the common (and then not so common) shapes you can make out of topiary. With classical topiary plants, as well as some more unusual pieces. This Topiary Library can act as a reference for people to learn more about pruning and clipping. The space is small but the aspect is great and the beds are deep enough to put some plants in. …
Delivery After Dark – From the Makers of The Amelia Project
Last week I spent most nights stood in cold water streams on the moors of North Yorkshire, helping to film a new project called Delivery After Dark from the makers of the Amelia Project. I worked on the Amelia Project back at the end of 2024, lending my terrible vocal talents to a small part in the episode Didius Julianus. But this project is something new – and exciting! – and thankfully only needed me to be filmed, rather than to actually say anything. But not only did I have to stand in cold moving water at midnight, I also …