Plant of the Month: Ceratostigma plumbaginoides
Tuesday 27 September 2011
This delightful plant is a member of the Plumbaginaceae family and comes from comes from West Sichuan, in China. Its common name is hardy plumbago or blue-flowered leadwort. It is a sub-shrub or herbaceous perennial with a clump forming habit putting...
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Pop up Garden Shop Fridays!
Thursday 22 September 2011
NEW! Starting Friday 23rd September, every Friday from 3-6pm we’ll be opening our garden gates and inviting you to enjoy our Pop Up Garden Shop! We’ll be selling seasonal fruits and vegetables, a great selection of plants, seeds, preserves, eggs...
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Nows the time to forage and preserve!
Sunday 18 September 2011
There is so much to be foraged in the hedgerows at the moment, including sloes, crab apples, haws, rowan berries, wild apples, plums and damsons and of course, black berries. My favourite thing to do with my ‘forages’ is to...
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Entertain in our Garden Room!
Wednesday 14 September 2011
Looking for somewhere very special to celebrate Christmas or the New Year with colleagues, family and friends? Our Garden Room is a unique space in a beautiful garden setting, ideal for relaxed and informal social gatherings. We cater for lunches...
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Our favourite Apple Chutney
Friday 9 September 2011
With thanks to Garden House friend Chris Batt for giving us his recipe for Apple Chutney a delicious way to use up your glut of autumn fruits, and to give away as gifts for Christmas Ingredients: 2lb onions, peeled and...
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Autumn, a favourite season
Sunday 4 September 2011
The first signs of autumn are upon us. Somehow the air just smells different, and rain aside, September and October are just about my favourite months in the garden. Although there is much in flower (in fact a wonderful time...
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Mark the date: Sussex Prairies Garden, 4 September
Monday 29 August 2011
Well worth a visit – on Sunday 4 September 2011 (from 11am until 5pm) a rare collection of exciting nurseries, artists and crafts people will be coming together at the Sussex Prairies Garden. Over 60 stalls will be displaying a great selection...
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Inspired in Edinburgh
Wednesday 24 August 2011
Edinburgh in August means Festival time, and I have just spent three wonderful days enjoying a cultural feast, involving the serious, the brilliantly clever, the poignant and the daft, and all thought provoking. We heard one of three pieces composed...
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Poem by Renee McAlister (gardener, and Garden House friend)
Friday 19 August 2011
Rudolph and Peter’s Garden, Early June, Late Afternoon 2011 Poem by Renee McAlister (gardener, and Garden House friend) Alcanet fusing with Geranium. African daisies shut-shy without sun. Bristling box with stray branches untrimmed. Spidery Iris like bee’s eyes: undimmed. The...
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Flower of the month: Passiflora (the passion flower)
Sunday 14 August 2011
At this time of year, hardy Passiflora are in full bloom. A wonderfully exotic-looking plant, the Blue Passion Flower (P. caerulea) has large white flowers and central filaments of purple, blue and white, followed by egg-shaped, orange-yellow fruit, and flowers...
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Thinking of booking an idyllic last-minute holiday?
Wednesday 10 August 2011
Spending time in my house in Metochi is very restorative. Here in Pelion one gets no sense that Greece is suffering at the moment, except for the emptier beaches and tavernas. The Greeks are on holiday, and Pelion is the...
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My magnificent cauliflower!
Tuesday 2 August 2011
This photo was sent into us by Juley, who attended one of our Garden House practical gardening courses. We cant claim all the glory of course (our amazing horticultural teaching skills!), but we did think it was a magnificent crop,...
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