Tom and I have been working hard on our Island beds this week; lifting and dividing plants from beds on the main borders, and anywhere else we can beg borrow or steal them. The whole bed is having a makeover and will seem ’10 years younger’ when we’ve finished with it! The overall plan is to mirror the main borders which have a lovely mix of grasses, perennials and shrubs. Read More...

 It’s been wonderful here at Harlow Carr this week!

 After two week of snow on the ground this week has felt very much like spring has arrived!! Read More...

It's a very exciting time now for the Alpine plant collection here at Harlow Carr, a great number of the earliest flowering plants are waking up and beginning to flower. It really feels like Spring is just around the corner! The Saxifrages are some of the first to flower and one of the nicest is 'Karel Capek', which has quite large peach flowers that last for ages.

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At last the snow is abating but for me it will be with some sadness. We have waited years for a return to the old snowy winters of ‘almost' folklore and when one is upon us we love it for about a day before the complaining starts, a very British trait! Personally I have loved every minute of it except perhaps when attempting to cycle to work and ending up falling off my bike with a thump which has happened a couple of times. Hopefully the recent harsh weather will kill off some of those pests and diseases alien to our shores that have taken advantage by surviving the milder winters of recent years.

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Well well what a week it's been here at Harlow Carr: global warming seems a dim and distant memory when you're standing in 12cm of the white stuff! The snow came down with a vengeance on Sunday evening, and Monday morning saw the whole garden team mobilised with all manner of shovels small and large. The car park was first to be under attack from the newly formed ‘snow army', followed by a path round the garden, opening up a circuit to enable all visitors access in time for opening at 9.30am. The gardens have a whole new aspect to them when covered in snow: it's all rather beautiful and takes on an air of mystique.

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