BRISTOL LIVES
“The idea I want to communicate is that you can evoke a place you love through plants” the forecourt reflects this new, welcoming space for the city, and brings a splash of colour to the building. I love the Highline in New York by Piet Oudolf; I used it as inspiration for the RWA by thinking about the planted areas as nature bursting through cracks in paving. I love Royal Fort Gardens.
JANE PORTER
Unlike a certain late-1970s new-wave singer, this Bristol garden designer does want to go to Chelsea . . .
J
ane Porter is having a busy year. There’s her regular work; she designs gardens for both residential and public clients, the latter including Bristol Museums. She’s also just designed the planting for the newly refurbished RWA garden, and will soon be exhibiting at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, in the newly judged container category. It all began when Jane moved into a house with a garden that had belonged to a very experienced vegetable grower… Feeling like I’d inherited something special, I did a
course on edible gardening at Windmill Hill City Farm. Then I found out there was a horticulture course at the Botanic Gardens, so I did that at night school, and when I qualified I started working part time as a
gardener. Pretty soon I was doing simple designs and helping out at flower shows, where I got the bug for design. I was working in a job I was very unhappy in when a friend
posted on Facebook that she didn’t know what to do with her garden. I asked her if she’d let me do a makeover, and she agreed. That project gave me the confidence to do more, and soon I had enough work lined up for me to leave my job. I look after the Georgian House Museum garden, and
I work with a lovely team of volunteers at the Red Lodge Garden. All the planting is true to the original planting.
The RWA is at an exciting point in its development – the
new refurbishment has brought so many much-needed changes. The planting I’ve designed for
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The gardens were beautifully landscaped in the early 1800s, and now, in the grounds of Bristol University, it remains a beautiful place to go. My own garden is always evolving, and the place I try out
new plants. We live in Windmill Hill, and the garden is 5m wide and 25m long. I have created lots of different areas; a patio I built myself from bricks I found in skips, a path through large beds of planting, a paved area with a pergola for dining, vegetable and soft fruit beds, a pond and a seated area that gets the evening sun. We live near a park, so the kids have space to bike there, and luckily they don’t play football.
I love plants that remind me of places, particular memories
of when I first saw them, or the people who introduced me to them. For instance, I love Briza grass because my aunt showed it to me in her friend’s house, and it reminds me of the affection she had for them. On the downside, now it’s bloody everywhere! I was born in Scotland and left when I was three, but my heart stayed there. For Chelsea I’ve designed a garden for someone from Scotland who doesn’t live there, and filled it with plants that remind them of the
landscape. With containers, you can choose your soil regardless of where you live. Scotland has a predominantly acidic soil, so my plant choices are all happy in ericaceous soil. This is the first Scottish garden at Chelsea in 17 years, so
it feels like quite a responsibility. Rather than try to represent the country overall I have thought about what I think of when I think of Scotland, and made it personal. The idea I want to communicate is that you can evoke a place you love through plants, and inspire people to think about what place they would like to bring into their own outside space.
Secret skills? I make very
realistic looking cakes. Things like a swan, Ann Boleyn’s head rolling off the block, a curled-up snake and a hernia operation . . .
My most regrettable habit is
buying plants with nowhere to plant them.
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