WILD THING!
How gardens got hip
(and the trends to know now)
It’s happened: I’ve turned into my
mother. I now wander garden centres on
Saturdays, swap seedlings with friends
and find an illicit thrill in aphid-hunting.
And as a thirtysomething I’m not alone —
according to a study last year, 54 per cent
of 18 to 34-year-olds would rather go to a
garden centre than a nightclub, and
83 per cent described gardening as “cool”.
Even if you only got into it for the
dungarees or because you bonded with
your house plants when you started
working from home, it’s a slippery slope
— and you’ll be composting before you
know it. We spoke to some hip
horticulturists about how to fashion
up your garden this summer.THE POWER FLOWER
If you plant one thing in May, make it a
nasturtium. “They are so easy to grow from
seed, look so stylish in pots of hanging
baskets and look great on your table in a
vase or in a salad bowl,” says Olivia Wilson,
founder of the British flower studio
Wetherly, who grows her own pesticide-
free seasonal flowers. “And when they go to
seed you can eat them as ‘poor man’s capers’
or let them self-seed and they’ll come up
again next year.” The fashion set’s favourite
floral designer, Willow Crossley, is a huge
fan — she grows hers into “nasturtium
towers” in pots using wooden supports, so
even though these are small, spreading
plants you can create different levels or
sculptural shapes.PICK A STATEMENT
COLOUR SCHEME
One way to make a garden look instantly
more curated is to stick to a colour palette.
This year the gardener and florist Arthur
Parkinson, author of The Flower Yard
(Octopus £33) — and with a very seductive
Instagram feed — is aiming to create an
antique carpet effect with shades of
burgundy, deep crimson and golden
highlights. “I’m trying zinnias — the
smaller-flowered sorts such as ‘Aztec
Burgundy Bicolour’ — French marigolds
en masse, especially ‘Linnaeus’ because
it’s tall, branching and airy, and lemon-
yellow ‘Bishop of York’ dahlias, as well asWords Charlie Gowans-EglintonMatthew Sprout/August, Stella de Smit/Unsplash40 • The Sunday Times Style