Forget Chelsea, my cheap plot is idyllic
THE RHS Chelsea Flower Show starts today, highlighting the sort of garden you can have if you have deep pockets. I’ve created my dream garden on a shoestring by using my creativity. There was no plan: it has evolved like a giant jigsaw, depending on my imagination and the items that other people were giving away. I made horse and cow sculptures from old bike rims, scrap wood, plastic hose and petrol tanks from long-departed motorbikes; the one-time chicken shed is now a beach hut; and my sister’s unwanted plastic dog kennel has been transformed into a pirate ship. The whole point has been to create a garden of interest without spending lots of money. I made a fake petrol pump from shop-bought MDF, but I prefer to turn something I’ve been given into a piece of garden art. Unlike at the Chelsea show, where thousands of pounds are spent on even the smallest plot, I like to make something as cheaply as possible and prove what can be achieved with a big dollop of imagination. An arbour with a seat in the front garden was built with discarded timber; a visit to the Hundred Acre Wood and spotting a Winnie the Pooh toy on sale in a charity shop for £2.50 inspired a character doorway on a tree in the back garden. I have been to the Chelsea Flower Show, admired the creativity and particularly enjoyed the artisan gardens, but it’s all based on how much money you’ve got and who you know. The same old designers are there year after year winning gold medals and receiving plaudits. It’s got rather snobby and very costly. Instead of simply looking attractive, the prizewinning gardens must have a ‘meaning’, which needs to be explained to us. I may not have spent much money creating my garden, but it’s my little masterpiece.
DAVID COX, Maidenhead, Berks. MY GARDEN began with a pond for my children to splash in. An ornamental pond followed in the Nineties, by which time I’d planted beech, oak, birch, flowering cherries, shrubs and sculptural conifers, which are now mature. But my chief achievement was in building rockeries from soil removed to create the ponds, paths and raised terraces. I had no idea when I began that I would create a micro-climate that the birds and bees love. My only problem are badgers. DIANA J. BRASS, Loughborough, Leics.