READER'S GARDEN
Sponsored by Project Giving Back, this unique garden is being designed by RHS gold medal winner Nigel Dunnett, who also designed the walled garden at Hospitalfield, and will reflect the coastal location of Hospitalfield Arts, a contemporary arts centre in Arbroath with its fragile and precious sand dune coastline. The design encompasses an outdoor arts studio and workspace, a setting for art practice, exhibitions, teaching, and performance. The 'craft bothy' studio is set in a beautiful and resilient garden, inspired by dramatic sand dune topography, with evocative coastal planting, which by its nature is resilient to different climates and weather.
Nigel Dunnet is one of the world’s leading voices on innovative approaches to planting design. He is a pioneer of ecological and sustainable approaches to gardens, landscapes, and public spaces with his work revolving around the integration of ecology and horticulture to achieve low-input but high-impact landscapes that are dynamic, diverse, and tuned to nature.
The planting of the RHS Chelsea garden evokes a coastal character with a great emphasis on foliage form, colour, and texture. Mirroring a sand dune environment, all the planting is established in sand, reflecting the current horticultural interest in using mineral materials such as sands and gravels instead of ‘perfect’ soil. A dune pool collects rain water from the studio and surrounding dunes, reflecting how water works in a natural landscape.
A highly-textured evergreen framework of trees and shrubs encloses the garden: multi-stemmed Lagerstroemia indica, with its striking flaking red and cream bark, and wonderfully contorted junipers and feathery tamarisk (Tamarix ramossisma), form the woody planting at a lower level, with taller gnarled Scots Pine (Pinus sylvestris) trees and narrow-leaved mock privet (Phillyrea angustifolia) forming a backdrop. Swathes of dune grasses mingle with drifts of colourful herbaceous plants, with mainly pink, blue, and purple flowers.
Describing his inspiration for the garden Nigel Dunnett said, “Chelsea is a place for new ideas, for experimentation, and to take risks, and that is certainly the spirit in which we have developed our garden. Working with Hospitalfield Arts, and their exciting and important work with contemporary art and young people has inspired me to take a very abstract and highly sculptural approach to creating a representation of the landscape of the Angus coast.
“Creating that dramatic dunescape has been a real challenge, and we’ve designed striking structures that hold the sand in ‘wind-blown’ shapes. The plants in the garden are all growing in the sand, and this highlights the growing interest in using sands, gravels, and aggregates to create and support diverse, resilient planting as an alternative to rich topsoils. We hope this garden will spark conversations about our changing gardening habits, as well as the importance of creating space for the arts in helping us understand and interpret our changing world."
Hospitalfield is dedicated to contemporary art and ideas. The mission of the Patrick Allan-Fraser of Hospitalfield Trust is to provide the “time and space’’ for artists to develop their work in the quiet surroundings of the Hospitalfield campus in the coastal town of Arbroath. Without the time to practise, evolve, fail, and then succeed, we would not have the great creative artists that we all deserve.
The vision for Hospitalfield was crystalised in the mid-19th century by the artist Patrick Allan Fraser (1813-1890) and his wife Elizabeth Fraser (1805-1873), whose legacy was to leave an estate dedicated to supporting artists and education in the arts. Hospitalfield has been a place of learning for artists since 1902 when the art college opened as a residential academy, becoming in 1938, a renowned postgraduate painting school. Today, the programme recognises the need for artists to have support beyond formal education, which is achieved through a range of Artist’s Residency Programmes.
In 2020, as part of an ongoing capital investment to restore the historic buildings and improve the site, Hospitalfield commissioned a new design for the walled gardens by Nigel Dunnett, an exceptional scheme that is tended and developed now with a gardener and volunteers. This garden tells 800 years of garden history, from the medieval garden of the hospital to the present day, a garden that has become a destination.
Lucy Byatt, Director at Hospitalfield, said, “At Hospitalfield Arts we support artists in their working lives and at all stages of their careers, inspiring young people especially to be confident that the arts have an essential place in the world. With the incredible garden that Nigel has designed for RHS Chelsea, made possible thanks to funding and support from Project Giving Back, we want to highlight the urgent need to nurture the creativity of young people, to raise the profile of arts education, and to inspire the next generation of artists.”
Hospitalfield Arts works closely with schools in and around Arbroath to nurture interest and talent in the arts at every level of education. The Hospitalfield Arts Garden is designed to be enjoyed by anyone who wants to use the garden as an arts space, including children, and after the RHS Chelsea Flower Show it will be relocated to a primary school close to Hospitalfield. Ladyloan Primary School is situated virtually on the beach in Arbroath and the relocated garden will be adapted to create a stimulating and important space for children and teachers alike to enjoy and for their creativity to thrive.
The Hospitalfield Arts Garden will be launched at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2025 which will take place in the Royal Hospital Grounds, Chelsea, London SW3 4SR from Tuesday 20th May to Saturday 24th May 2025.
Project Giving Back (PGB) is a unique grant-making charity that provides funding for gardens for good causes at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. PGB was launched in May 2021 in response to the Covid-19 pandemic and its devastating effects on UK charitable fundraising, effects that have since been exacerbated by the cost of living crisis.
PGB aims to boost UK-based good causes by giving them an opportunity to raise awareness of their work at the high-profile RHS Chelsea Flower Show, as well as supporting the relocation of the gardens to permanent homes after the show where they can continue to benefit the charities and their communities.
If you would like to see your garden featured in a future edition of Scotland Grows magazine, please do get in touch to mail@scottishgardeningmagazine.com - we would love to hear from you!