The Show Gardens at Malvern Spring Show were recently described by a television presenter as a ‘mixed bag’. In a way I can see where the presenter was coming from but this is the very thing I love about Malvern, all the gardens on show are very different.

The standard of design and planting gets better and better each show, at this point I am not going to tell you how long I’ve been going to Malvern, but suffice to say enough to have witnessed the changes over the years.

So if you were looking for a little piece of the Mediterranean, a garden you could transpose and make your own, a wilder look where natives and cultivated plants grow together or a childhood memory made into horticultural reality then you were well catered for this year.

 

The Villaggio Verde garden ‘Reposer Vos Roues (Rest Your Wheels)’ was a slice of Southern France, you could see yourself stopping for a little glass of something in the rustic café with the scent of lavender in the air .

 

 

‘Solar Chic’, ‘A Woodland Kitchen Garden’, ‘Return to the Med’, ‘The Haven’ and ‘Light is the Load’ all had elements that could be transposed in whole, or in part, to most gardens.

 

I loved the use of the parasol Photinia in the ‘Solar Chic’ garden.

 

 

‘A Woodland Garden’ had a vegetable patch which I can only dream of, as an army of slugs is once again on the march in my own garden!

 

Given the long, grey, and positively grim winter we have all endured it was the colourful planting which lifted the spirits in ‘Return to the Med’, ‘Light is the Load’ and ‘Single Track Mind’

 

 

In ‘Boathouse No.9’ I liked the mix of native and cultivated flora and the attention to detail, which is a trademark of Show Gardens by this Designer

 

But the garden which made me actually laugh out loud, much to the surprise of the visitors around me, was ‘Serving Thyme in the Garden of Gallifrey’. I can see why it was a favourite of the visitors, you may not want it in your own garden but it was full of fun and theatre, which, after all is what Show Gardens are all about. But more to the point, who hasn’t watched Dr Who from behind the sofa?