THE MODERN MINT BLOG
Modern Mint are running a project for the Chelsea Fringe.
The project is called “You Should Have Seen It Last Week…” a phrase you will often hear a gardener say when they show someone around their garden. It seems wherever you go, the garden always had less weeds and more flowers back then…!
What is the Chelsea Fringe?
If the Chelsea flower show is the spectacular, trendy, stunning starlet of the horticultural world, the Chelsea fringe is the anarchic, homemade, anything goes fun lover that won’t be home until dawn.
Now in its 3rd year, it is a platform for artists and gardeners to express themselves, to club together for three weeks and encourage gardening in all its forms. If it is interesting, related to horticulture and legal, it’s in.
A real positive for London, as urban space gets ‘greened-up’, there is also great virtue in not spending a lot of money, being imaginative and sharing in the goodwill out there as spring begins turning into summer.
What is the project?
A group of willing photographers, including Tower Hamlets Cemetery and garden designers Amalia Robredo and Anthea Harrison, will be taking photographs of a plant or landscape everyday for three weeks, from May 17th to June 8th.
These pictures will then be placed on the Chelsea Fringe page of the Modern Mint website, and as material builds we will be able to see a gallery of what the plant or plants did actually look like last week!
Where did the idea come from?
The phrase “… you should have seen it last week…” is a normal part of the gardener’s armoury, and worth poking a little fun at. We also tried to get people from all over the world, not just the UK, to take part (and we managed it, with two gardens from the southern hemisphere and several more from across Europe) as we thought it would be great fun to see and compare a peony in Kent just coming into flower, while a cherry blossom from Kyoto begins to pale and fade… while someone in Northern Scandinavia photos the snow melting from the petals of a crocus.
Taking a photo everyday for the whole duration of the Chelsea Fringe also gives us a chance to see how it changes, a flowery version of this, basically… http://everyday.noahkalina.com/
We hope you enjoy and look forward to hearing what you think!
Happy Chelsea Fringe!
Topiary, The Art Garden at The Henderson
The Art Garden at The Henderson in Hong-Kong has now opened to the public. I joined the project last March, to work with Gillespies Landscape Architects on the topiary that had been designed for the Art Garden, which gives a calm, green space below the extraordinary Henderson skyscraper designed by Zaha Hadid Architects. The garden has been designed with butterflies in mind, so lots of nectar plants, and has other art projects and installations within its footprint. The history of the site is interesting too – it was originally the first cricket ground in Hong-Kong! So still a green space….! …
ClipFest 2025
On Sunday June 22nd there will be Clipfest 2025 at Ichi-Coo Park in Surrey. It is a celebration of all things pruning and topiary, and I will be there in my capacity of teacher at the European Boxwood and Topiary Society to demonstrate tool cleaning and sharpening, and how to clip. Tickets can be found here on Eventbrite. We are hoping for great weather and to see lots of keen pruners getting their shears out and joining us at this amazing garden! And for more on topiary…
Secateur Holders
A present arrived from Norway today, from a student who visited last February to work with Chris Poole and I on learning topiary. His new hobby – a beautiful and neatly stitched secateur holder. Thrilled with this! The holder will save me keep losing my secatuers too…! Thank you Bernt! It was the same student who introduced me to the APA with whom I am doing a talk at the end of March. Tickets can be bought here for ‘Defining The Essence – Aesthetic Pruning in the Garden’. Do join the European Boxwood and Topiary Society for that!