Diarmuid Gavin says the secret is a mutual relationship between a garden and a gardener – not a battle
Diarmuid Gavin (Image: Diarmuid Gavin)
Gardening experts Diarmuid Gavin and Carol Klein discuss the joys of gardening.
As gardening experts, Diarmuid Gavin and Carol Klein are on the front line of understanding what’s happening to our climate.
From the long, cold winters and changes to rain patterns, to how the burning of fossil fuels is contributing to global warming alongside intensive farming, Gavin, 61, and Klein, 80, are keen to showcase how gardens can still be a beautiful refuge for nature.
For celebrity garden designer Gavin, who won a gold medal at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, and Gardeners’ World host Klein, who was crowned the 2023 RHS Iconic Horticultural Hero, gardening is a mutual relationship between a garden and a gardener – not a battle.
It’s a journey 15 homeowners featured in the new six-part BBC One Northern Ireland gardening series, Greatest Gardens, embark on as they transform ordinary spaces in their homes into outdoor sanctuaries.
In each episode, Gavin and Klein take a trip to Northern Ireland to find the best gardens. They are also joined by a celebrity guest who helps them assess the overall design, creativity, planting skills and how the environment has been considered for the three gardens competing for a place in the grand final, to win the Greatest Garden title.
Ahead of the release, Gavin and Klein discuss what they enjoyed about their experience.
DIARMUID, YOU TRAVELLED AROUND NORTHERN IRELAND FOR GARDENING TOGETHER WITH DIARMUID GAVIN, WHAT WAS DIFFERENT ABOUT THIS SERIES?
DIARMUID GAVIN: The difference is, first of all, getting to do this with Carol, who is a legend in gardening, really worldwide, somebody who is full of life, vitality and knowledge and interest. She really wants to dive into a garden, get to know the garden and the people. So that was utterly amazing and such a privilege.
And the second was then to be joined by people whom we know from television. For each episode, somebody new would come, always with an interest in gardening, who wanted to learn or had different experiences.
It was also just a lovely summer spent going through gardens in the north of Ireland. It was all a pure joy; you couldn’t have asked for a nicer situation.
WERE YOU IMPRESSED BY THE STANDARDS OF THE GARDENS FEATURED?
CAROL KLEIN: I don’t think we were surprised, but we were delighted because every garden was different and had something really special about it. Both the gardens and the gardeners were just delightful.
I think everybody will find that this is a gardening programme like no other. I don’t mean that usual gardening programmes aren’t joyous, but this is much more joyous than usual.
Every minute of it is just filled with joy and wonder, I think. And as far as the standard of the gardens, I really thought they were cracking. They were brilliant gardens, and all so different. But the thing that all of [the gardeners] shared was this passion for their garden.
DIARMUID GAVIN: Being hands-on gardeners ourselves, we understand what it’s like when anybody is coming to see your garden. Never mind the television crew or anything like that.
You worry, you work. You want to show it off to anybody at its best, and you’re always thinking, ‘Oh, you should have been here last week.’ So we understood what people have been going through to get their gardens ready for us. They all shone true.
CELEBRITY JUDGES INCLUDE PRUE LEITH, PENNY LANCASTER AND KATIE PIPER. WERE YOU IMPRESSED WITH THEIR KNOWLEDGE OF GARDENING?
CAROL KLEIN: They all had different kinds of interests in gardens. I think Prue was really well-versed in plants. She got a new garden now; she was in her old garden for a long time, and she’d been persuaded to plant lots of grasses, which is prairie-style gardening.
But she renewed her love of herbaceous borders from some of the gardens we visited, and I’m sure her garden has changed since the programme finished. I’m sure she’ll have put all that Prue Leith colour right back into the garden and is looking forward to the summer ahead.
DIARMUID GAVIN: That’s right, because she’s a colourful personality. If Prue came on a cooking programme and was wearing grey, with no accessories, you’d be really surprised. So it’s great that it gave her a renewed interest in colour.
WHAT ARE SOME OF YOUR FAVOURITE PLACES IN NORTHERN IRELAND TO GROW AN ILLUSTRIOUS GARDEN?
DIARMUID GAVIN: I think we really enjoyed County Down. We were based in Holywood at the Culloden Hotel. So leaving there to go coastal every day was a dream.
CAROL KLEIN: It was such an eye-opener for me, because, of course, Diarmuid already knows these places so intimately. I’ve only been to Northern Ireland a couple of times before, and I just want to go again, because it was magical.
It’s such a small geographic area, in some ways, so to find these hugely contrasting gardens, designed by different people with different priorities about their gardens, was just wonderfully enjoyable.
WHAT CAN VIEWERS TAKE AWAY FROM THE SERIES?
CAROL KLEIN: I think that wonder comes across in this programme. People are going to feel so engaged and love it. They will find something which they can adopt or bring into their own gardening, whether it’s a particular plant or something you can do in a really shady spot, or how you can grow ferns, or knowing which tree or shrub to plant.
DO YOU HAVE ANY BASIC TIPS FOR BUDDING GARDENERS WHO ONLY HAVE A SMALL SPACE?
CAROL KLEIN: Try propagating, grow some seeds. Everybody can grow seeds. Seeds just want to grow. So whatever kind of space you’ve got, providing you choose something that is really straightforward and is just going to give you glory in its first year.
Grab a packet of calendula seeds, and at the end of the season, you can go out with your paper bag and collect the seeds again for the next year. Just engage with it in that way. Never mind the experts, never mind the books, never mind the telly. Just get out there and start doing it.
DIARMUID GAVIN: That’s right, because nature and soil and rain, they’re the real experts that make it happen.
The one thing I would say is that not all the gardens we had were big. We had some really small suburban gardens. And there was one lad who loved what he was doing in his front garden so much, he knew the house next door was rented, so he asked the guy who owned the house if he could take over that garden too. That was individual thinking.
A lot of these people wouldn’t have been gardening with big budgets. So propagating was central to the way they managed to create their own beautiful visions.
Greatest Gardens with Diarmuid Gavin and Carol Klein comes to BBC iPlayer and BBC One NI on Monday, March 23
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