PROFILE | THE GREAT GARDEN SHOW| BATH LIFE | ISSUE 545 | READ HERE
From 9th May, The Newt in Somerset will host its inaugural Great Garden Show, a nine-day programme of horticultural talks, garden installations, interactive workshops and plant sales. The curated programme aims to inspire all ages, from budding young horticulturalists to expert industry panellists – with learning, craft, cultivation and food always at its heart.
The event is hot on the heels of The Newt’s four-year run as headline sponsor of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, from 2022 to 2025. During this time, the partnership focused on the theme of “Gardening for Good”, with The Newt supporting the RHS’s ongoing charitable work in scientific research and community programmes. With the headliner baton duly passed to Range Rover for this year’s show, The Newt plans to bring the spirit of the great flower shows home, to Somerset
The open weekend will see a series of celebrations for all the family, with promise of music, dancing and more – all to the backdrop of The Newt’s gardens in their full springtime bloom. Weekdays will see The Newt deep dive into this year’s theme, ‘The Story of Gardening’, examining regenerative agriculture, climate-resilient growing and long-term sustainability, with gardeners, growers and chefs all sharing their expertise.
The event’s hosts are keen to inspire the next generation of horticulturists too, with students and schools invited to join talks and tours with The Newt’s own expert gardeners on the Monday. Young visitors will be encouraged to make their first foray into the world of gardening through special family-friendly sessions running throughout the show. These will include, amongst many, a new Spring Trail weaving across the estate, educational activities in the Beezantium, flower crown making, and a ‘Design a Planter’ workshop.
The gardens themselves have been shaped over the last two centuries by successive garden enthusiasts, from Victorian horticulturist Margaret Hobhouse to Penelope Hobhouse, who gave Margaret’s vision a new lease of life in the late twentieth century. The latest incarnation of the garden is the vision of Italo-French architect Patrice Taravella, a strong believer in the need for a garden to be both beautiful and useful. Completed in 2014, at the garden’s core sits the Parabola, a walled garden and home to a collection of more than 600 dessert apple trees. These are trained in all manner of forms and have recently been given National Collection status, with varieties planted out by county of origin.
From the Parabola, visitors are invited to a wealth of treats that combine the ornamental with the productive, from the grand potager-style Kitchen Garden to the Four Seasons Garden; a formal space designed to hold interest throughout the year, through cherry blossom to scented roses, topiary and autumn leaves, to spring bulbs and summer climbers.
Inquisitive visitors are invited to further explore the 3,000 acres estate. Its ancient, diverse woodland provides logs, leaves and berries for the estate’s restaurants, and habitats for wildlife too. And as guests make their way through the estate, they are also encouraged to learn of its many stories – of its past, its present and its future. Inspired by the unearthing of a settlement on the estate, Villa Ventorum is The Newt’s reimagining of a Romano-British villa, one accompanied by an innovative and educational archaeological museum. A short walk away sits The Story of Gardening, an interactive space that explores the history of gardening and the human impulse to shape beauty from the ground up. The space will also play host to a number of events and drop-in sessions throughout the event.
Members to The Newt enjoy free entry to several prominent national and international gardens, including Kew Gardens, Wakehurst, Great Dixter, The Lost Gardens of Heligan, Winterthur in the USA and The Newt’s sister garden, Babylonstoren in South Africa. The Friday of the event will see Harry Baldwin, The Newt’s Head Gardener, hosting a breakfast alongside gardeners from those very partner gardens.
In line with The Newt’s ethos, seasonal, farm-fresh produce will sit at the heart of the show, with special menus and pop-ups celebrating such produce. Alongside barbecues in the gardens, pre-orderable picnics will also be on hand featuring strawberries and cream and freshly-shucked oysters. Fermentation pioneer Sandor Katz will also host a dinner in the Garden Café, while sister farm Babylonstoren will present its rosé wine at a special lunch in the Cottage Garden.
The show will close on the Sunday of the second weekend, where the team will be conducting an estate-wide ‘Bio-Blitz’. Focusing on the diversity of the estate’s flora and fauna, they will share ideas on creating eco-friendly gardens, show camera-trap screenings of wildlife spotted across the estate, and invite everyone to take part in wildlife counts, from butterfly spotting to insect ID-sweeps in the meadows. Here’s wishing the inaugural event every success – hopefully the first of many annual shows to be held at this inspiring Somerset destination.
