New Year Plans

And a new Planting through the Seasons tutorial

A very happy new year to you all. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been having cabin fever not being able to get outside and do anything in the garden as it has been so interminably wet. I’m lucky, I live at the top of a hill with no chance of flooding, but I know that a huge number of people have been affected by flooding, and my heart goes out to you. As I write, the forecast looks a little more hopeful for this weekend and next week, so let’s hope the saturated ground is able to dry out and we can finally get back out into our gardens to stamp a little order on them. My own garden is looking somewhat bedraggled, the borders tangled with collapsing stems and grasses, the blackened geranium and alchemilla foliage desperately in need of a cut-back. In other words, not at all photogenic. So meanwhile, I offer a few photos of what I’m fervently longing to see again in my garden - tulips, forget-me-nots, honesty and all those myriad shades of intense green that appear as the herbaceous plants start emerging. The photo above got lots of comments on Instagram this week!

In this year’s journal I’ll continue my monthly posts with garden tasks (free for all), but for my paid weekly posts I’d like to offer a new Planting through the Seasons tutorial. In these posts I want to share with you the nuts and bolts of how I design my planting schemes and how I look after my garden on a week-to-week basis. So for example, I might send you a list of annuals I’m sowing for my pots this year (including some interesting new varieties) with notes on when and how to sow. Or I’ll take you step by step through the planning of a border, with my secrets on how to create that elusive balance of structure, texture and colour. Weekly notes will enable you to see what I’m doing in real time, so you can follow me in your own gardens. (I know many of you don’t live in the UK so I will include US hardiness zones where appropriate). I’m also lucky enough to visit lots of inspirational gardens and nurseries through my job at House & Garden, so sometimes I’ll veer off into someone else’s garden to glean new ideas from them, or ask them to volunteer a plant of the week. Talking to garden designers, plantspeople and gardeners over the years is how I have learnt my gardening, and I’d love to pass all that on.

It’s my view that a garden can be completely transformed by plants alone, and if you plan your schemes well you can bring colour and interest into your garden for almost every month of the year. I also believe that planting design is a constantly changing and evolving craft. Having created a planting scheme, you can’t just stand still and let it go. Like a child, it needs nurturing, correcting and even taming at times. It must be constantly observed and watched over to make sure it doesn’t misbehave. And if something isn’t right, it needs to be changed. But for me, it is the doing of gardening that is so rewarding, and the creation of a beautiful border that you can look out on and interact with every day - a living work of art - is one of the absolute joys in life.

If you’d like to join me for this year’s Planting through the Seasons tutorial, sign up or upgrade your subscription by clicking the subscription button below (if you already have a paid subscription you don’t need to do anything). You can try it for a month for £5 or subscribe for the year for £40. And if you have a gardening friend you think might be interested, do let them know too (hit the Share button below). Writing my Substack Journal has become one of the most favourite parts of my job as a writer and gardener and having you as paid subscribers means that I can devote more time to sharing all the information I have gleaned over the years. So as always, thank you, and I’m very much looking forward to sharing my new gardening year with you all.

Clare