Thursday, February 12, 2009
Decorative floral file folders
Filming the 10th anniversary show at Tatton Park has been a real treat for the team. Huge crowds turned up for the filming of our closing piece to camera featuring Joe Swift, Carol Klein and Rachel de Thame. It only took 18 takes for our esteemed talent to trip the light fantastic up Chris Beardsaw's garden and sample some '10th anniversary Tatton' cupcakes which were given out to all children under 15 who visited the show. Remember, kids go free! 'Have a go Joe' had a go at making a 'lunkie' also known as a 'smoot'. The crowds loved his attempt at thatching. He was offered a stick in the rural crafts marquee but as he quipped, he's hopefully not going to need that for sometime yet! Joe also went all artistic as he turned his hand to willow sculpting when he made two ears for a hare. Carol was at home in the floral marquee where of course she used to be an exhibitor. She was amazed by the high standard of the plants, in fact she's convinced that this year was the highest standard she's ever seen. Her highlights were the Hampshire carnivorous plants and Southfields nursery stands both of which won gold medals. Carol was also a bit partial to the perennials in the marquee which were fabulous this year due to the weather conditions having been particularly good in helping them get to peak performance at the right time. Rachel's enjoyed a blooming good time in the BFA marquee where eight of Britain's top florists competed for the title of 'Florist of the year'. She was on the sidelines as the competitors had to complete a surprise challenge, they had to create a floral masterpiece with a random selection of blooms, bits and bobs.
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Gardening tomato plants yellowing leaves
Lupine at Quail Hollow Ranch, CA USA
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Daffodils in late April
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Robert Nyman
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Show gardens at flower shows are always very subjective, the judges are looking for one thing, the gardening press another, and very often the public are just looking for something they can recreate in their own garden. All too often they don't agree on which should be the winner.
At Tatton Chris Beardshaw's garden, 'Cheshire's Year of Gardens 08', pleased all three and it's easy to see why it was awarded the Best in Show title. Recreating a classic english country house garden with bold herbaceous borders on both sides was a sure fire winner. I loved the predominantly pastel planting and highlights of gold added by the Catalpa at the end. I'm told there are subtle elements from at least 12 Cheshire gardens incorporated into the design, including the famous double borders at Arley Hall. If you're visiting the show and you know your Cheshire gardens see if you can spot them. 
According to my colleague Louise I have 'Boy tastes'when it comes to gardens and some of the other designs i liked typified this. The 'East Meets West' garden (Gold) was created by combining the traditional elements of a relaxing Japanese Zen garden with a contemporary seating area and blocky water feature. 
Angular water features were in evidence in several other gardens i liked, including the 'Adlington Relax and Reflect Garden'(Silver-Gilt), with white walls, red containers and interesting grassy planing scheme and 'Always There' (Silver-Gilt) a garden created to promote the work of the Samaritans. This was just my cup of tea, with green the predominant colour and plants chosen to complement perfectly the stonework and rusted steel used within the design. 
The judges awarded just two gold medals and four silver gilt at Tatton this year and I'd completely agree with their decision. A number of gardens featured heavy stonework waterfalls including 'Go with the Flow' (Silver), My Little Piece of the Lakes (Bronze) and Natural Distinction (Silver-gilt) and I think all of them could have done with a bit more planting to soften the hard landscaping. 
Elsewhere 'Real Life by Brett' (Silver-gilt) brought the traditional northern back garden into the 21st century and was definitely drawing interest from the crowds. 'Hot Dry Days' (Bronze) took a more Mediterranean approach and showed how we can adapt our gardens to the changing climate. Who knows, if the weather continues to be as hot and sunny here as it has been this week maybe bananas will soon catch on in Manchester? Info from:
Private Club
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Custom guitar floyd rose
Yellow flower with background out of focus
Lotus blossom in white with lotus pad as background.
In album Lotus flower photo - Lotus blossom images - Lotus pond photos
Robert Nyman
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flowers - flowers.png
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Pink tulips, Ottawa Tulip Festival
Robert Nyman
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Pink tulips, Ottawa Tulip Festival
Crocus - the first flowers of spring 2008
white flowers - flower.jpg
DSC00479.jpg
A poppy is about to bloom.
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Best in show was awarded to Matthew Soper of Hampshire Carnivorous Plants and he was delighted.
"This is a very special year, not only because of this award at Tatton Park but it means we have won ten consecutive golds at Chelsea, ten at Hampton Court, ten at BBC Gardeners' World Live and now ten at Tatton Park and best in show. I couldn't be more pleased, it's fantastic!" Well done to Matthew. I couldn't mention the floral marquee again without letting you know how Medwyn Williams got on. Well, his gold medal record is as unblemished as his prize winning vegetables; another gold for Medwyn and an unbroken record. And to top it off the sun is shining! I'm really not used to this at a flower show, I might have to go and have a lie down. In the sun. With an ice cream perhaps... I'm not sure if it's to keep 'us' in...or 'them' out but on Tuesday, the BBC local radio team were surrounded by a seven foot high fence. However, I'm relieved to report that we were left with a narrow escape route.
We started broadcasting on Wednesday with reporters and presenters from BBC Radio Stoke, Coventry and Warwickshire and Manchester. Luckily they managed to find us. You can see the aerials on the top of the 'OB' van, you can't really miss them, they're 20 foot tall - 
you just can't work out how to get in to them. We also did '2-ways' for BBC Radio Wiltshire, Oxford, Lancashire, Hereford and Worcester, Sheffield, Tees, Gloucestershire and Jersey. What's an 'OB' or a '2-way'? Like many organisations the BBC is full of jargon and acronyms...I'll share the secrets with you another time. Info from:
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Florist flint michigan
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atheana
DCF 1.0
Lotus bud - yet fully closed. At this stage the pink lotus flower has a pink color of the bud outside, while the white lotus bud is clean green.
In album Lotus flower photo - Lotus blossom images - Lotus pond photos
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new crystal cand elabras on the way to Pollen - latestpicturesgallery032.jpg
Robert Nyman
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Daffodils in late April
Flower
Another yellow flower
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Purple Flower
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bouquets in vases waitng for their starring moment! - 07360004.jpg
Crocus - the first flower s of spring 2008
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An average lotus blossom develops approximately 20-30 lotus seeds. The final step of the lotus flower life cycle is shown in my next photo.
In album Lotus flower photo - Lotus blossom images - Lotus pond photos
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Daisy
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August sun shine and storm lanterns set for the walkway up to the loggia at Newick Park Hotel - 019-7.jpg
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Pink tulips, Ottawa Tulip Festival
The back to back gardens are a unique feature of the flower show at Tatton Park and they are arranged in groups of four all over the showground, what I like about this is that as I walk around the show I stumble across a square of gardens and keep seeing ones I haven't seen before, also you can get a really good look at them because they're nicely spread out. Out of 27 back to back gardens at the show, five were awarded the coveted gold medal, best in show went to Reaseheath Alumni with '5 a day with hidden play' a garden dedicated to growing and eating plenty of fruit and veg.
'A garden for bees' (Gold) designed by Ness Botanic Gardens highlights the importance of our buzzy little friends. It's beautiful too and more than dispells the myth that wildlife gardening has to be wild and woolly. 'Butterfly Journey' (Silver-gilt) is another wildlife friendly garden at the show. 
It's packed with the sort of plants we could all try to grow more of, to attract native butterfly species into our gardens. I noticed a fair amount of black in the back to back gardens, 'The back to basics garden' uses black to dramatic effect as a backdrop and in the planting with two stunning Cercis canadensis 'Forest Pansy' and a generous sprinkling of Cosmos astrosanguineus, another garden which features this plant heavily is 'Urban retreat' (Silver) which also uses black as a backdrop but mixes acid greens through the dark flowers and foliage, a great combo. 
'Reflection' (Silver) uses colour but it's much more gentle here. The decking and fencing is stained a soft grey and is set off by touches of galvanised metal used as edging and in the form of poles used throughout the garden as a suggestion of a boundary. These double up as plant supports too, this is an idea I might well take away with me... 
A garden that addresses a very common problem is 'The scented walled garden' (Silver) and it speaks volumes that I had a good long look at the garden, admired it, made notes, took a photograph and still had not realised that it had been designed with wheelchair users in mind, it proves the point that a garden when well designed can fit a specific brief and be gorgeous too. Info from:
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