Latest News
8 August 2008: Our NGS open day on the 3rd of August was very successful with 150 visitors and we raised £800 which brings our total so far this year including private visits to £2800. Many thanks to all our visitors and our helpers.
27 June 2008: I have finally got around to adding some new photos of the garden taken during June 2008.
16 June 2008: We will be opening the garden again this year for the Kidderminster Horticultural Society Gardens Open day on the 6th of July.
16 June 2008: We had another successful NGS open day and raised £624 with 113 visitors and it didn't rain on us. With our large private group visits over the next few weeks we should add considerably to the total raised so far. Many thanks to all our visitors and once again to our helpers without whom we wouldn't be able to open the garden. Thanks also to the Halls and Andrew for allowing us to use the field for parking.
14 June 2008: The garden will be open on Sunday the 15th of June for the NGS from 12 noon to 5pm. Please note that parking and the entrance to the garden will be via our gate in Lowe Lane which is just around the corner from our main gate by the cottage in Honeybrook Lane. Click here to see a local map.
25 May 2008: On Thursday the 22nd of May I was invited to the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in London to attend the awards ceremony for the International Garden Photographer of the Year Competition. Even though I didn't win a prize I am thrilled that two of my photos made it into the finals from the thousands of photographs entered. Click here for some photographs of the exhibition.
My photographs, Cyclamen Hederifolium and Japanese Maple Leaves are being exhibited at Kew Gardens until the end of September with all the winning and finalist images and they have also been included in the book of the competition published by the AA.
Garden Photographer of the Year: Collection 01
Click to buy from Amazon.co.ukOne of my photos, Japanese Maple Leaves is available to order as a high quality print on paper or canvas from Art on Demand.
7 May 2008: Our first NGS open day of the year was a success despite the poor weather. It rained as usual for the first couple of hours and then cleared up a little but we raised £527 and had ninety visitors which I was very pleased with. Many thanks to everyone who visited and we look forward to seeing a lot of you again later in the year. I would also like to thank our helpers without whom we couldn't open the garden - Alan, Hazel, Fiona, Ron, Sheila, Richard, Eric, Sheila and Mum.
14 April 2008: Great News! In the last few months I entered several photos in the International Garden Photographer of the Year Competition. I am very pleased to say that I have had two photographs selected as finalist images.
7 April 2008: I heard today that I have won first prize in a photography competition run by the English Garden magazine which I'm really pleased about. The link to the photo on their website no longer works but this is the photograph.
6 April 2008: Some new photos of the garden after a heavy snow fall last night. By lunch time the snow had all melted.
I have started to submit some of my photos to the Alamy photo agency and hope to add alot more soon.
22 December 2007: I checked our nestbox fitted with a camera a couple of days ago and was delighted to find that a Great Tit is using it for his winter bedroom. Click here to view a short video of him getting ready for bed.
20 December 2007: A Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all our visitors to the garden and the website. I have been taking some photos of birds and frosted plants in the garden this month.
10 November 2007: Some photos of the garden in Autumn taken during October and November.
I have also published my own book on the creation of the garden from 2003 to 2007 which I am quite proud of. It won't be for sale in shops but is a great keepsake for the future and I've ordered copies for family and friends. You can see a preview version at MyPublisher.
25 October 2007: We were finally on tv today but it was worth the wait, I thought the garden looked beautiful and mine and Alan's performances were pretty good too. Hopefully the programme will bring some new visitors to our NGS open days in 2008 which are on the 4th of May, 15th of June, 3rd of August and 7th of September from 12pm to 5pm.
15 October 2007: The episode of Open Gardens featuring our garden is now due to be broadcast on BBC 2 at 3:15pm on Thursday the 25th of October, fingers crossed.
7 October 2007: It looks like our garden is not going to be on Open Gardens on the 9th of October and at this point we don't know when it is due to be broadcast.
On Friday I visited Arley Arboretum and took some photographs. In a couple of weeks the Autumn colour should be beautiful.
19 September 2007: Some new photos of flowers in the September Gallery.
12 September 2007: A few new photos taken in the garden this month.
24 August 2007: The BBC series Open Gardens starts on the 3rd of September at 3:15 on BBC 2. The programme featuring our garden will be shown on Tuesday the 9th of October. Click here for more about the series.
21 August 2007: Despite the rain and cold wind we still had 120 visitors to our NGS open day on Sunday and raised £518 bringing our total for the year (including private NGS visits) to £2423 which is a great result. Thank you to all our visitors who braved the awful weather to visit the garden, we look forward to seeing you next year. A big thank you to all our helpers for making the open days so successful - Alan, Hazel, Andrew, Fiona, Ron, Sheila, Richard, Eric, Sheila and Mum.
Also some new photos of flowers in the garden in the August Gallery.
18 August 2007: I was on BBC Hereford and Worcester Radio today talking about the garden. You can listen online until Saturday 25 August on the BBC Hereford and Worcester website. I come on about 1 hour 35 minutes into the show.
I have also been told that the BBC series Open Gardens is starting on September 3rd and the programme that features our garden will be broadcast on the 9th of October on BBC2.
It is our last NGS open day this Sunday the 19th of August so please visit if you are in the area.
4 August 2007: Some new photos of the Prairie Garden and wildlife pond.
31 July 2007: Aerial photos of the garden from our helicopter trip.
23 July 2007: The final day of filming Open Gardens with Carol Klein.
22 July 2007: Despite the poor weather we had 173 visitors to the garden and raised £815 for the NGS on our open day. A big thank you to all our visitors and our helpers.
21 July 2007: The garden has gone international in the Canadian newspaper The Star Phoenix. To see a clipping click here.
20 July 2007: More publicity about the garden in the Express and Star newspaper.
20 July 2007: Some new photos of the garden taken in July
17 July 2007: Publicity - Our local newspaper the Kidderminster Shuttle has kindly done an article promoting our NGS open day on the 22nd of July.
7 July 2007: The fourth day of filming of Open Gardens.
1 July 2007: We opened the garden today along with five other local gardens to raise money for the local charity Forest Dog Rescue. After a wet start the sun came out in the afternoon and we had over one hundred visitors and raised over £150 for the charity.
25 June 2007: We had our first National Gardens Scheme Open Day yesterday and raised £502 which we are very pleased with considering the poor weather. This morning part of the garden is flooded from over-night rain.
13 June 2007: Some photos of the garden and plants in June
6 May 2007: A few photos of the garden in May
3 May 2007: The third day of filming of Open Gardens
10 April 2007: Our second day of filming of Open Gardens with Carol Klein .
13 March 2007: Our first day of filming for the new series of Open Gardens which will be on the BBC in the autumn.
10 March 2007: A new gallery of Spring flowers in the garden in March 2007.
9 February 2007: Great News - Our garden is going to be filmed for the BBC series Open Gardens with Carol Klein. Also some photos of the heavy snow.
18 Septemer 2006: We are opening for the National Gardens Scheme in 2007. See above.
12 September 2006: New photo in the Garden Gallery of the prairie garden which is looking really good at the moment.
21 July 2006 - Click here for a map of the garden which we gave to visitors on our open day in June. Also find out about the new path and retaining wall.
25 June 2006 - The Garden Gallery has been updated with a lot of new photographs taken recently and details of our next project are online.
18 June 2006 - Our first garden open day. Eleven garden will be open in Kidderminster from 11:30am until 6:30pm. Tickets cost £3.00 per person to view all eleven gardens.
Update: A very successful day with over two hundred visitors to the garden. The scones with clotted cream and jam went down really well. In total we raised over £460.
26 April 2006 - New photos of the feature wall and arch, the new path and bamboos.
31 March 2006 - Construction of new path started and arrival of new specimen shrubs
