Yorkshire’s unique dry stone walls are one of the UK’s most spectacular and best-loved landmarks.
Now visitors to the 2012 Harrogate Spring Flower Show (26 – 29 April) will have the opportunity to recreate their own little piece of Yorkshire landscape with the help of local horticultural students.
In a series of new hands on demonstrations to encourage show visitors to ‘Have a Go’ at a range of gardening skills, 20 students from the Askham Bryan College Harrogate Centre will be inviting people to roll up their sleeves and learn how to create a traditional Yorkshire dry stone wall in their own garden at home.
The students’ daily demonstrations will also include getting to grips with other tricky landscaping skills such as block paving, laying turf and planting a garden border.
Course Tutor Nigel Harrison said:
Our students thoroughly enjoy working with other gardeners to help pass on new skills. Often, the biggest thing that holds people back is the confidence to just have a go and try it – that’s something we hope to give them at the flower show this spring.
Over the last few years, we have introduced a number of new show features aimed at inspiring and encouraging more people to get involved with gardening and to take away new ideas or skills they can try at home.
Have a Go takes our range of live demonstrations and interactive activities one step further by inviting our visitors not only to see how it’s done, but also to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty.
The spring and autumn Harrogate Flower Shows are the UK’s biggest independent gardening events, attracting nearly 100,000 visitors and over 1,000 exhibitors a year.
The 2012 outdoor show gardens, sponsored by Abbots Green Luxury Lodge Living, include ideas for creating a garden bird paradise, a sustainable Blue Peter-style family plot, a peaceful haven for wildlife and their human friends, and a comfortable retreat for a busy GP.
New designers this year include:
Leeds-based PWP Landscapes with a modern outdoor living and entertaining space
North Yorkshire team of New Leaf Landscapes and Keith Ledger, both from Thirsk, who will be creating a tranquil but productive garden
Essex-based Linale Landscapes, with a serene escape from the stresses of modern life
Former recruitment consultant Lee Bestall, who started his Sheffield business after training with TV garden expert Diarmuid Gavin as part of the BBC programme Garden School. He will be creating a pocket-sized writer’s pad.
Other key features this spring include Britain’s biggest floral art marquee, with a stunning array of more than 160 works of art, spectacular large scale exhibits and daily demonstrations. Gardening with Nature also returns with family-friendly activities, including creating a wormery and armchair bird watching.
Hundreds of beautiful spring blooms and painstakingly produced plants will be on display as part of the annual shows staged by the North of England Tulip Society, Northern Group of The Daffodil Society and Yorkshire Bonsai Society.
Experts from Kitchen Garden Live will give advice on growing fruit and vegetables, and the Garden Roadshow will be on hand to answer gardening conundrums.
