The City Gardener

Every year in late July, a sleepy and pastoral corner of Cheshire plays host to an explosion of plant life. I'm not talking about the blue-green algae on the local pond. I'm talking about one the best spectacles in the North for plant lovers: the RHS Tatton Flower Show.  It's become a real mecca, providing an annual boost of inspiration and imagination for die-hard gardenistas - and a great day out for people who just love the stunning variety, the atmosphere of the fair, and the opportunity to get their hands on the latest in gardening fashion. Like everything, garden fashions do change, and Tatton provides an insight into what's hot and what's not in the world of horticulture this year. So I've tried to capture some of the movers and shakers for 2018. So, what's hot? Sanguisorba minor If there's one plant that stood out this year, it would be this rather unassuming herbaceous perennial, commonly known as  Salad Burnet. Providing gr...

It's hard to conceive of Winter in the height of Summer. As the earth bakes hard under an unforgiving sun, cold and frosty days - only 6 months ago - couldn't be further away. But try to imagine for a minute those short, hurried afternoons, where numb fingers and runny noses are only a prelude to cosy nights! Because this is a story that starts in the depths of Winter.  For Christmas, we got the best present two boys could have wished for. It wasn't the sort of present that could fit on the sleigh or down the chimney. It was an email, letting us know that (after some wrangling) we'd got our festive mitts on an allotment, a patch of ground we could call our own. So it was that, in the dying hours of 2017, we ventured with anxious anticipation into one of Manchester's hoods of questionable reputation to see what awaited us. Colin (who we've since learned is a champion pea grower and authority not to be reckoned with) showed us our plot. A whopping 17 metr...