Staff on the Hartley Botanic stand at the Chelsea Flower Show welcomed a very special guest this weekĀ āĀ Sarah is the granddaughter of Norman Hartley who together with his brother Vincent founded V & N Hartley in 1938. Sarahās mother Elizabeth (Normans daughter) has spoken to Sarah of her memories of visiting Chelsea the year of […]
Perennials are often touted as āeasy-care,ā but not all perennials are equal. Like many gardeners, I want ones that donāt need frequent dividing or deadheading. I need plants that are not fussy as to soil or weather conditionsāand come back year after year. Thatās a lot to ask for, I know, so this month Iām […]
If you have not grown anything in Europe lately, you may not have noticed the battle going on between peat moss and coir. Well, it’s not actually a battle. More like a rout. Peat moss, which came into widespread use in the late 1940ās, has been vanquished back to its bogs. The reason: peat (or […]
One of my favorite places, the great Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago, is all shiny and sparkly. In a good way. I remember when it was shiny and sparkly in a bad way: the day in June 2011 after golf-ball-sized hailstones smashed 60 percent of the glass in the nearly 2 acres of display greenhouses […]
