Easter holidays are often a great time to be outdoors with the family.  It would be great if it warmed up a bit here in the UK, but even if this cold snap continues to linger, it’s still worth getting outside in the fresh air.

Many gardens have events for children during the Easter holidays so I thought it might be helpful to share a few with you here…

The National Trust

The National Trust have teamed up with Cadbury and are holding Easter Egg hunts in many of their gardens around the UK.  Many of the gardens have other things to offer too – Winkworth arboretum of course has the most amazing display of bluebells, if they’re out in time of course and Cliveden is home to a spectacular display of some 10,000 bulbs.

The RHS Gardens

There’s always something going on for children at The RHS gardens and Easter is no exception.  At Wisley this Easter they have put together a programme of rainbow themed activities including a Rainbow Trail, sow and grow, a sculpture workshop and bubble making.

Painshill Park

Painshill Park is a local garden to me in Surrey and it’s where I trained so I know it pretty well.  It’s a great place to take the children whatever the time of year because there’s so much open space for them to run around, but this Easter they have put on some special activities.

These include a woodland egg and spoon challenge, wild Easter camp, build a wild den and a visit to Grotto Island which includes the chance to make a mini-grotto.

Kew Gardens & Wakehurst Place

If you live in the London area then Kew is a great garden to visit.  They are organising an Easter Egg Hunt on Easter Sunday, 31st March.

Wakehurst Place is organising a Plant Portraits Easter Trail where children make a flying butterfly headband to lead them on their way.

I have covered only a few venues here so it’s worth checking out your local garden to see what they’ve got planned for the Easter weekend.  Now all we need is some sunshine!

(Images: Lisa Cox)

As some of you know, I am the co-ordinator for our local Society of Garden Designer’s cluster group and yesterday I met up with the other cluster leaders in our region at RHS Garden Wisley.

I just had time to zoom round the garden before our meeting so I thought it would be nice to share some of the photographs I took.

I was SO lucky with the weather yesterday as the sun seemed to appear at the most appropriate moments and this really brought the autumn colour to life.

The area outside the glasshouse was looking fabulous…the statuesque beech columns and perennial planting and grasses, which still has structure and interest even though their lushness has disappeared.

I love the autumn colours, how warm and vibrant they become when the sun makes an appearance.  It’s my favourite time to be out walking.  This year they seem to be more intense don’t you think?

Or is that because it’s been such a rainy summer here in the UK that we’ve forgotten what the sun can do to lift our spirits!?

I’ll leave you with some more hydrangea pictures.  The wonderful showy heads of flowers are as beautiful now as they are in the middle of summer…

Images: Lisa Cox for The Room Outside

The Landform Garden

The Landform garden was designed by Catherine MacDonald and was sponsored and built by Landform Consultants.  It won Gold and Best Summer Garden and it wasn’t difficult to see why.

I loved the planting in this garden – rich and warm and perfectly in tune with the steel pergola and grey boundary fences.

The garden was inspired by the High Line in New York, the linear park that was created along a derelict elevated railway line.  It had a contemporary yet relaxed feel about it.

Celebration & Jubilation

I couldn’t not talk about this garden because it was designed by my friend Jayne Thomas.  I have to add that it’s not the only reason I’m featuring it here, I thought the garden was wonderful.

When I spoke to Jayne on Press Day she was telling me about the challenges she had with the planting - she even had to raid her garden on Press Day morning because one of the roses had develped mildew the day before!  Jayne was awarded a Silver medal.

What I loved most about this garden was that you could imagine it being your own.  The garden was designed for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, a very British garden.

There were little extra touches too - you can just about see the corgi-shaped cookie on the table in the above picture. There were six pools of water, one for each decade of the Queen’s reign…

And look how beautiful the metal crowns were in the flower bed and on the top of the entrance posts…

These were hand crafted by Lucy Quinnell, Blacksmith at Fired and Iron in Leatherhead….an amazing place to go and visit if you haven’t been already.

Preserving the Community

This garden represented a once dis-used piece of wasteland which had been brought back to life by a community team for everyone to use and enjoy.

It had a great feel to it – as thought you really were at the back of an allotment somewhere.

It was very ordered, with a place for everything, but designers Anthea Guthrie and Nicole Burnett still managed to create a slightly disorderly space that you would expect from a project with lots of hands in the pie.

The garden was sponsored by Pretty Nostalgic and also built by them along with Chris Williams and Cath Jones.  It was awarded a Silver medal.

Coastal Drift

This garden was designed and built by Susan Willmott & Adele Ford and sponsored by Wyevale East Nurseries.  It represents part of a larger garden, a corner where you could relax and unwind.

It features plants and materials that are associated with a coastal location, grasses and perennials that thrive in well drained soil in sun and timber, pebbles and shingle.

The design for this show garden won the Student Design & Build Award in 2011, a competition run by Wyvale East Nurseries.  The garden won a Gold Medal.

(Photos: Lisa Cox for The Room Outside)

At last I am in a position to show you the final design and I can’t wait to see it at the show ground when it’s finished this week.

Rob has been involved with the RHS Flower Shows for the last few years.  They built the Thrive Garden, designed by Jo Thompson, at Chelsea in 2010 which won gold and Best In Show and in the same year they were also involved with the RHS Biodiversity Garden which was designed by Fisher Tomlin.

Last year they made the benches and bridge for the Laurent Perrier Garden which was designed by Luciano Giubbilei and won a gold medal, and at Hampton Court Flower Show in 2007 Rob was involved with Fiona Stephenson’s garden ‘Oak Tree Lying in State’ which, again, won a gold medal. This year they decided that it was time to showcase their own work and I am really thrilled to be involved.

Initially we got together for a couple of hours one sunday and spent some time sketching out ideas. The stand measures just 3m x 6m so it became quite clear that it was going to be challenging to show off the many different things that they can do.

One of the challenges that we’ve faced is the location of the stand which, because it’s amongst the trees, means that we are not allowed to excavate below ground level.  Our initial idea was to have a covered seat at the back of the stand as a focal point but this had to go by the wayside when we realised that it was impossible to construct it without setting the posts into the ground.

The stand being on the small side has however been in our favour because Rob has been able to build the stand in their workshop near Guildford.  This has been invaluable as we’ve been able to test ideas and look at elements in-situ to ensure that the balance is right.  I think it’s been a team effort and we’re all really proud of how it looks now that it’s finished.

On Friday Rob dismantled the stand all ready for it to go up to site this morning.  Because it’s been constructed off site, it’ll only take a couple of days to reconstruct at the showground so they expect it to be finished by Wednesday evening. I’ll be keeping you in suspense just a little bit longer to see the photographs of the finished stand – I thought I’d wait until it’s at Chelsea to do that!

The show gardens weren’t on such a grand scale as Chelsea but it was really great to be able to speak to some of the creators, something that’s not really possible at the bigger shows.  Harry Rich won Silver-Guilt and Best In Show for his Naturalistic Garden which was inspired by the Brecon Beacons and was my personal favourite too.

The Regeneration Garden also won Silver Gilt which was designed and built by Broxton & Morussi Landscaping.  The garden was designed and constructed useing waste materials sue as pallets, slate, logs.  The shape of the slate walls was inspired by an unfurling fern frond.

The Off The Shelf garden, designed by  Gaynor Witchard represented a contemporary but practical garden that was constructed using products that are readily available.

The “A Dream Journey” garden was a bit quirky and fun. Its aim was to highlight the benefits of travelling by train, both from an environmental and personal point of view,  The two halves of the garden represent the natural landscape at the beginning of thew hourney and the dreamscape that the passenger experiences as they relax & enjoy the experience.

As ever, the floral marquees were full of wonderful plants and, as you’d expect at this time of year, there were lots of Spring bulbs on show.  The tulips were particularly gorgeous…

One of the features of the Cardiff Flower Show is the school wheelbarrow competition which has been running for 6 years.  There were some 56 designs this year and all entries linked to the theme of ‘sports and shoots’.  This is the only part of the show that is judged by the public.

There were some amazing inventions…

Like a local show, there as also entertainment there…I couldn’t not mention “the fastest grannies in the west” who were quite a surprise to see at an RHS show, but they were really quite hilarious!