‘Grasses made me the gardener I am today’
The first plant I ever grew My first experience was buying bedding pansies from a hardware store. I spent ages deciding on the ‘faces’ I liked best! Gardening was in the family, my grandfather and uncles did it. Wherever you went there were plants, so it was inevitable I was going to do it, too.
The plant that shaped the gardener I am today Ornamental grasses. I started working in horticulture in Devon with woody plants, but gradually saw it was grasses that were an important part of the landscape and they took me over. My favourite plant in the world Rosa glauca is the most beautiful plant, and every day has something to offer, even in winter. It was growing at the hospital where I was born and I know it as the Middlesex rose, after the hospital. I’ve grown it in every garden I’ve ever owned.
The plant that made me work hardest As much as I love them, grandiflora delphiniums need constant attention to grow them to perfection. My grandad used to grow and show them at the RHS Westminster shows in London and I know how much work they entailed, so regretfully they’re not for me in my current garden.
The plant I’d like to grow more of I adore our native purple moor grass, Molinia caerulea. There’s a naturalness to it and there’s always something happening to it through the seasons, even the wind causing the stems to ripple. I love change in a garden.
The plant I am in human form It has to be the deep red fountain grass, pennisetum ‘Rubrum’. It needs TLC in winter, and as I get older that’s what I need, too!
The plant that helped shape my life
When I worked in Torbay I had a National Plant Collection of ceanothus. It led to friendships in the USA, and I travelled widely to visit them, as well as to see plants in the wild.
The plant I’d always give as a gift It always has to be something they can grow – right plant for the right place – but if had to choose, pennisetum ‘Fairy Tails’ is very different in character to most grasses. It’s hardy and can’t wait to flower over a long season from mid-summer onwards.