Friday 16 December
My First Blog
Andy Sturgeon
I wasn’t sure why M&G had asked me to design a garden for them at Chelsea 2012 as I couldn’t see how my style fitted with their more traditional brand. Although I often create country gardens for period houses I am definitely known for making modern gardens. I thought I’d better bring this up at the first meeting in case they had mistaken me for Chris Beardshaw. Although I’m taller than him this has happened before with embarrassing consequences which I won’t go into now. Anyway, the meeting went well and even though I was sitting down and it was hard for them to tell how tall I was they definitely had their man.
To cut a long story short I felt that the prestige of the M&G brand was an excellent fit for me and I was extremely keen to take on the project as I had been looking for an occasion to really explore the more traditional aspects of my designs. It was a golden (touch wood) opportunity so I offered to produce something more trad than my usual Chelsea offerings and promised to come back soon. It must be something to do with that flat 10 x 22m rectangular plot but because there isn’t a setting, a building or even a view for inspiration I kept coming up with ideas which were just too modern. The floor of my studio became littered with screwed up paper and the recycling bin had to be emptied several times a week before finally I had something of an epiphany.
I was writing an article for the Financial Times about the enduring appeal of English gardens abroad and what makes a garden ‘English’ in the 21st century. And then it dawned on me that even if I’m designing a contemporary space much of the approach and the ethos is based entirely on Arts and Crafts principles, whether it be the use of local and traditional skills, the formal geometry of the layout with exuberant planting or simply the use of natural materials. The more I thought about it, the more I realised what an excellent fit it was and so I set out to design a modern garden using ideas and principles from this movement. We decided to describe this style as ‘The New English Garden’
Look back in January when I’ll be writing weekly posts charting my journey to Chelsea.
Andy Sturgeon
M&G Garden 2012 designer
