“It’s a cottage garden in the city”
Emma Bridgewater’s factory garden delights visitors from March to October. Creator Arthur Parkinson shows us around
Emma Bridgewater’s factory garden delights visitors from March to October, with cut flowers, rustic plant supports and rare-breed hens
This enchanting cottage garden has a picturesque ‘rustic farmyard’ look. Its sleek black sleeper beds are planted for a succession of cut flowers from March onwards, when the neat gravel paths become animated with rare breed hens and ducklings. This smart and stylised country look is no accident: the garden belongs to the Emma Bridgewater factory in the Staffordshire potteries. “All the flowers I grow are evocative of Emma’s distinctive pottery designs,” explains gardener Arthur Parkinson. “The hens and flowers are iconic to Bridgewater, so it’s only right that people can see them when they visit the factory.” This inspirational garden was the brainchild of Emma’s husband Matthew. “He’d already created a walled garden behind the giftshop,” explains Arthur. “But he realised the space needed someone who would take it in hand and give it the attention it deserved. I think for a garden to succeed it needs to be loved.” Visitors to the pottery can now see some of the plants that have inspired Emma’s cream-coloured eathenware designs – tulips, roses and wallflowers among them. “The garden has expanded into the larger yard too,” says Arthur. “Here, flowerbeds have created a beautiful place for customers to enjoy lunch in summer.” It was Arthur’s love of breeding chickens that got him the job. “Matthew’s also a poultry fancier so we were already in touch about hens. Then, when he realised I was a gardener, he asked me to consider coming to work here in the factory’s garden.” When Arthur first arrived four years ago this was just a concrete yard. “We had to create the garden on top of the concrete and cobbles,” he explains. “We built a series of raised beds from painted sleepers, with the largest raised bed along the cafe’s outside wall. “Galvanised zinc bins and reclaimed cattle troughs provide vintage-style places for planting. Every autumn I like to make a ‘bulb lasagne’ of tulips and alliums
“All the flowers I grow are evocative of Emma’s pottery designs”
in our small dustbins. I like containers to be big, not dinky – and I won’t use plastic.” The garden’s factory location does have some advantages. “The two greenhouses are above the firing kilns, which is a very handy way to keep the frost off during winter. It can be a problem in summer, though, when the wallflowers wilt because they’re too hot.” The garden springs to life in March, when its gates open to factory visitors. “That’s the time when I start hatching eggs and sowing annual seeds,” says Arthur. “Most of our hens are bantam Pekins, but I also have Buff Cochins, which are great big plodding ginger
giants. Bantam ducks also come and go; I hatch them here and they grow up in the garden over summer, then I find them forever homes with proper duck ponds.” The raised flowerbeds are filled with a succession of vibrant cut flowers – starting with tulips in April. “They’re a signature plant here,” says Arthur. “I like the large frilly parrot types – my favourites are purple ‘Blue Parrot’ and magenta ‘Victoria’s Secret’. Then, alliums take over, such as ‘Purple Rain’, ‘Purple Sensation’ and ‘Violet Beauty’. Once they go over, we dry and spray their seedheads gold to decorate the shop at Christmas.” In early summer, biennial ‘Sutton’s Apricot’ foxgloves make a stately appearance, bringing extra height to the flowerbeds and drawing bees from far and wide. Their arrival coincides with the factory’s annual literary festival. Long-f lowering cosmos are another bee pleaser, appearing from June onwards. “My favourites are ‘Double Click Cranberries’ and deep cherry-red ‘Rubenza’,” says Arthur. “They look really good with a backdrop of the annual grass, panicum ‘Frosted Explosion’. It creates haze-like firework explosions above the flowers and looks amazing lining a path edge or in a pot.” Arthur has also established a big bed of roses for June and July, having planted some beautiful bareroot old English cultivars last year including velvet-purple ‘Tuscany Superb’ and caramelbrown ‘Hot Chocolate’. In the haze of late summer, from July onwards, dahlias take centre stage. “I love them,” says Arthur. “But rather than use the double decoratives that the earwigs love, I prefer the black-foliaged bishop series, such as ‘Bishop of Llandaff’. I also love the newly bred anemone types including ‘Blue Bayou’ and ‘Totally Tangerine’. They’re packed with nectar that draws in the bees and butterf lies in late summer.” Supporting this ever-changing cast of cut flowers is a timeconsuming job. “I gather silver birch branches to use as stakes, making teepees and arches for climbing annual plants such as thunbergia and sweet peas, as well as some of the taller, ganglier plants,” says Arthur. “Birch gives a more naturalistic effect than bamboo canes or plastic supports.” It’s clear this idyllic city oasis owes much of its beauty to Arthur’s experiments with successional planting. “A garden like this is a seasonal showcase, so I’m always trying to find new ways to delight the visitors. Last year I grew lots of thunbergia – their prolific apricot flowers are great for taking over the show from midsummer sweet peas. “Planting for a succesion of flowers has to be carefully planned. Hopefully, here I’ve managed to have something in bloom for a good eight months of the year.”