THE MODERN MINT BLOG
Modern Mint Shop
Modern Mint Garden Design has been up and running for almost 8 months now. As well as Garden Design services we also want Modern Mint to be a place to go to for interesting articles, garden knowledge AND we want to share with you in our shop products we love – products that are unusual, fun, sustainable and beautiful.
We want to promote people and organisations that produce items based on their own individual creativity (check out this great arm chair),
locally sourced or artisanal products (this from the potteries in Stoke on Trent, mugs to make you laugh),
… and an ingenious way to use up unpopular wool that would otherwise be heading for the bin (wool wellie warmers!)
Take a look and let us know what you think, more items are going up every day on the shop as we start to build up our collection of goods.
And if you MAKE any unusual products and would like to include them in our shop please do get in touch!
Clipsham Yew Tree Avenue
With Chris Poole of the European Boxwood and Topiary Society we visited Clipsham Yew Tree Avenue in Rutland. Do you know it? Amazing place! Chris and I were teaching a topiary workshop in order to give local people the skills and technique, and tenacity! to help with the pruning of the avenue and elevate it to something even more special than it already is. Read more about the workshops here. We hope to run a further workshop in September 2026, as well as teach an advanced course too. Check the teaching page through the year as it will be updated …
Aesthetic Pruners Association – New Talk In December
An organisation I love and have been learning lots from in the last two years is the Aesthetic Pruners Association based in the USA. Sharing knowledge with them about clipping and the overlap – and differences! – in style is something worth exploring, so I recommend a visit to their website and to join onto their events and talks, which are all on Zoom meaning you can access them from anywhere in the world. No excuse not to learn! The next event will be led by Jocelyn Cohen and be about ancient trees in the British Landscape. This is such …
The Amelia Project – Episode 88: Didius Julianus
Friends of mine write a sitcom podcast called The Amelia Project (I wrote about this years ago, when they started it….!) December 2024 I had some fun playing the tiny part of Fornio in episode 88 – Didius Julianus. I have not listened to the episode yet, as I am clearly not an actor… and the thought of listening to my dulcet tones for the few minutes I’m in it just… makes me feel ill. But the recording and being in the studio was great fun, the real actors were hilarious and the script is brilliant – not just funny, …