The Diminutive Charm of Forest Floor Flowers

With its long history of medicinal use, I find yarrow to be one of the most incredible and fascinating common garden plants.An herbaceous perennial and member of the

Have you ever visited a botanical garden on a warm spring day and marveled at tulips in a rainbow of colors, with shapes ranging from cups to stars, contrasting striations, and ruffled edges?Now’s your chance to bring a taste of that awes

Tulips are popular around the World, often known as the soul of Spring, and historically symbolic for perfect love. Finding the perfect Tulip for your location can often be challenging, particularly as many of Tulip cultivar’s are fussy and short-lived.

It’s an age-old debate that’s almost impossible to avoid when living with another person: Does silverware go up or down in the dishwasher? And is there even a right answer? Since the popularization of the dishwasher, how to load this appliance has been a hot point of contention, particularly when it comes to silverware. Should silverware be rinsed first? Should you organize each utensil so like is grouped with like? Should you use the silverware basket or the rack, if your dishwasher is a newer model? Some people are adamant that silverware should be placed handle-up, while others insist on handle-down—but those aren’t actually the only options.

Zinnias are truly marvelous flowers, spectacularly colorful annuals that are incredibly easy to grow.And they come in a dizzying array of colors,

The Artless Charm of a true Cottage Garden While I’m as beguiled as the next person by pretty cottage garden style planting that you see at the flower shows, the real deal is so much more joyous. I’ve recently visited my 88 year old friend Deryck whose exuberant garden is about as far as you can get from designer chic.

The Bohemian Charms of Charleston On a perfect summer’s day, a colleague and I spent a morning with Mark Divall, the charming and modest head gardener at Charleston. What a treat.

Retail therapy at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2014 by Daniel Carruthers The Chelsea Flower Show, now in it’s 101st year, is revered for its wonderful gardens showing the latest trends in garden design. The show does also have many other elements of inspiration too with a wide and often unsung retail section. Predominantly the Eastern Avenue is the shopaholic gardeners first port of call with everything on display ranging from hats and gardening apparel to seeds and works of art.

The Colourful Charms of Kinsale We visited some wonderful villages and towns in Counties Kerry & Cork, but my favourite was Kinsale, a lovely Georgian town with many of the original houses still surviving and a decidedly colourful approach to decorating them. It was also a fine example of how Ireland has managed to resist chain stores – with a population of roughly 5,000 people (and many additional holidaymakers in the summer) it has three independent bookshops – oh that our town of 70,000 had even one! It was also the location of the best domestic garden we saw on our travels.

If you have the space for this very large plant – common name Giant Sea Holly – it really is a 5-star architectural presence in the garden at the end of the year. At Great Dixter they grow (and sell) the cultivar ‘Physic Purple’ that originated at the Chelsea Physic Garden.  I photographed it at the Plant Fair beginning of October and again at the Christmas Fair at the end of November and it was still looking superb.

The ancient principles of Feng shui say the kitchen is the ‘heart of the home.’ It represents prosperity, nourishment, and health. Apart from being a vital part of our life, it can also usher abundance and good health if you grow these Lucky Indoor Plants For Kitchen!