Don't dilly-dally with your Dahlias

The trouble with dahlias is that they tend to conjure up images of men on allotments growing flourecent blooms for the local flower show.  They are seen as old fashioned, which is a shame because there are hundreds to choose from, they flower prolifically and are pretty easy to grow.

Chelsea 2012: The Laurent-Perrier Bicentenary Garden

Arne Maynard’s romantic Laurent Perrier garden was one of our favourites at Chelsea, and deservedly won a Gold Medal.

The Taiwanese Orchid Tree

This Orchid Tree on the Taiwan Orchid Growers Association stand at Chelsea was made up of orchids in test tubes that were attached to a bare tree.

Chelsea 2012: (Not So) Fresh Gardens

This year Chelsea had a new category of gardens on show, replacing their Urban Gardens, but we didn’t think the Fresh Gardens were an improvement, although there were a few good ideas.

Chelsea 2012: The Brewin Dolphin Garden, by Cleve West

This Gold Medal winner was also voted Best Show Garden by the RHS judges, and was certainly a very accomplished, beautiful and sophisticated garden, full of nice touches.

Chelsea 2012: Best in show

The standard of the large show gardens in Chelsea this year certainly seemed up on the last few years (as demonstrated by the RHS judges decision to award 9 Gold Medals between the 16 show gardens).

Chelsea 2012: The Rooftop Workplace of Tomorrow

There were many aspects of the Rooftop Workplace of Tomorrow, designed by Patricia Fox, that we really liked, such as the recycled plastic furniture and planters that looked like stone.

Chelsea 2012: The Westland Magical Garden

The Westland Magical Garden, designed by Diarmuid Gavin , won the RHS award for the Most Creative Show Garden, although it was only given a Silver Gilt Medal.

Chelsea 2012: Lilium martagon + RBC Blue Water Garden

One of the flowers of the show was the Lilium martagon (or Turk's cap lily), which was on several show gardens, but especially prominent on the Silver Gilt Medal-winning RBC Blue Water Garden, designed to help promote water conservation by Professor Nigel Dunnett, who created our favourite garden at Chelsea 2011 (the RBC New Wild Garden).

Chelsea 2012: On show

There were lots of quirky displays, interesting artworks and expensive plants on show at Chelsea 2012. Above is one part of a 3 x 24 metre hand-painted canvas, Constructed Nature, by Hugo Dalton.

Chelsea 2012: Artisan Gardens

The Satoyama Life garden won a Gold Medal and was also chosen as the Best Artisan Garden – and for once we agree with the Chelsea judges, although it was a pretty obvious choice as it was easily the best of the small gardens – we also particularly like the designer’s work and his intricate use of moss.

Autumn at Winkworth Arboretum (National Trust)

Winkworth Arboretum is National Trust-owned woodland, in Surrey, near to Godalming, and is famed for its fall foliage, mainly thanks to numerous species of maple amongst its collection of more than 1,000 different shrubs and trees, many of which are rare.

Chelsea 2011: Our best in show

The garden we thought was best in show at Chelsea was the RBC New Wild Garden, sponsored by the Royal Bank of Canada and designed by Nigel Dunnett, Director of the Green Roof Centre at the University of Sheffield.

The judges only found it worthy of a Silver Gilt medal, but we thought it had more good ideas than any other garden, although at 10x12m (33x39 feet) it was one of the smallest of the 'large show gardens'.

Chelsea 2011: Cancer Research UK Garden

The Cancer Research UK Garden, designed by Robert Myers, won Silver Gilt, and had a lot of interest, especially in the interplay of textures, light and shade.

Chelsea 2011: Laurent-Perrier Garden

The Laurent-Perrier Garden, Nature and Human Intervention, by the Italian designer, Luciano Giubbilei , won Gold. It was built and planted by Crocus.

Here there was a modern take on a Japanese pavilion by Kengo Kuma, which used 16 revolving wind-driven panels made out of lots of thin pieces of bamboo, that provided interesting shadow and texture and looked a lot better at the show than it did on television.

Chelsea 2011: Homebase Cornish Memories Garden

Designer Tom Hoblyn won a Silver Gilt for the Homebase Cornish Memories Garden, having been marked down by the judges for not fulfilling his own brief to base the garden on the native plants of Cornwall, instead using many of the species more commonly found in the famous Cornish gardens (such as tree ferns and rhododendrons).

Chelsea 2011: M&G Garden

The M&G Garden, designed by multi award-winning garden designer, landscape architect and journalist Bunny Guinness, won a Silver Gilt medal.

It had been expected to win a gold, and possibly should have. Apparently the judges felt that too much was packed in to it, but we rather liked much of the design and planting in this very ordered kitchen garden.

Autumn colours - Leaves

Maple leaf in a New England stream

Fall foliage is one of the best things about Autumn. We've been on a couple of leaf peeping trips to New England, which can look spectacular as the leaves turn various shades of red, yellow, purple and gold. But, there are plenty of places closer to home that look good in Autumn, such as the Royal Horticultural Society gardens at Wisley, Westonbirt Aboretum, which has the national Japanese Maple collection, or, here in London, Kew Gardens. Even the streets near us have displays of Autumn colour, whether in people's gardens or from street trees.

As seen at Hampton Court

 Umbrellas: The traditional symbol of the Hampton Court Flower Show, this year only needed for shade

The RHS Hampton Court Flower Show takes place every July, which usually means it is a sea of mud (coming, as it does, just after the rain magnets of the tennis at Wimbledon and the Glastonbury festival). This year, all three events stayed dry... isn't that one of the signs of the Apocalypse?

Geranium - Mrs Kendall Clarke

We have several geraniums in the garden, including: Geranium Cantabrigiense Biokovo,  G. Gravetye and G. Mrs Kendall Clarke. Geraniums are an ideal choice for a bee-friendly garden, because honey bees, solitary bees and bumblebees all love them, they are easy to grow, and produce lots of flowers.

Geranium Mrs Kendall Clarke

Mrs Kendall Clarke has an AGM (award of garden merit) from the RHS (Royal Horticultural Society). This means it should be a reliable plant to grow, no bad habits or nasty diseases.

It will give you masses of pale blue flowers with white veins. It is happy in full sun or partial shade and should flower throughout the summer (starting in early to mid June).

13th June 2010

We love it because our bees love it too. They are happily visiting every flower and stocking up on nectar.

It will self seed - so, you could save a few if you want to propagate it around the garden. Alternatively deadhead on a regular basis (to encourage repeated flowering) and increase stock by dividing the plant in spring or autumn.

Once it has finished flowering it can be cut back and will produce more foliage. It will take a couple of years to fill out, with a spread of about 50cm (and 40-50cm height).