Is gardening becoming too elitist?

I was just looking through the Guardian this morning and came across this article on creating a courtyard garden:

Courtyard gardens: Kitchen sink drama | Life and style | The Guardian

I raised my eyebrows when I got to this bit: "the courtyard has been worth every penny of the £30,000 redesign."

30k on a courtyard garden!? There maybe a little Bolshevik in me after all! :D

 

In our garden 'Wonderwoman' just loves her bedding plants, hanging baskets etc, whilst all I do is plant out trees and shrubs and try to design beds etc. It seems to work well for us, and I too believe that the whole has to be a sum total of the parts
We went to Chelsea once and enjoyed it immensely, even though it was rather too crowded. But, having been there, I really don't feel the need to return
Shiney ... what do you eat? You certainly come from a long lived family and I want some LOL

 

Those 'lifestyle' articles always seem calculated to get up everyone's nose, though, don't you think?

'Peregrine and Lou-Lou have created this chic, quirky outdoor space from a disused sewage processing area using only found materials and around £500,000 of the old man's dosh. 'We love it here,' says Lou-Lou, 34, sipping vintage Dom Perignon out of a charming vessel created from an old foul water pipe, 'and the soil is absolutely marvellous. You can grow anything.'

 

You crease me up Clare! :D

Are you hobnobbing up Henley way today?
There is a posse of us travelling up in abut 20 minutes.
PM me with your number if you're coming, we'll sip cocktails while lambasting Henriettas and Ruperts.

 

I don't think theres much elitism. The people at the Nat Trust where I volunteered for a while weren't elitist at all, and both the times that Ive been to Chelsea no-one has been eletist.

However. I was the youngest person there while I was volunteering, by miles. There were I think 2 others within 10 years of me (I'm 20), but they worked in different areas. And this was in one of the biggest Nat Trust gardens. Thats what I think the problem is with gardeining. With out meaning any rudeness at all, there are too many old people. Granted, I may be looking in the wrong place, but there are so few people around my age, that I think is the problem.

Also, there is a problem with pricing. Thanks to a Tesco voucher deal I am an RHS member, and it cost me £100 for me and a friend to get to Chelsea on Tuesday. Which is fun on a student budget. Still went though, loved it (not drinking saves money). Basically anthing like that costs a lot of money. Especially with Train tickets. It cost me around £40 to get to the £3 RHS orchid show...

Also, the gardens at Chelsea are alright, but the Pavillion makes me want to go again. This year was my second time, and I went again this year purely on what the Pavillion, and dont regret it one bit. But that could be because I'm less of a gardening gardener, and more of a plant collecting gardener. If that makes sense.

 

' there are too many old people. '
LOL

I think you meant to say that

' there are not enough young people'

There is a massive difference you know

 

Hah, yes, that'd be the way to phrase it. I wrote that late last night, and couldn't think. Sorry!

 

Whiy is Chelsea/Hampton Court 'elitist' - I know numbners of people who have been/go to either or both, surely his does not make them any different to anyone else. If going to the theatre costs around £50 per head in London are all theatre goers 'elitist'.

By my reckoning we should live and let live and enjoy whatever lifestyle we aspire to; life really is too short to worry over such trivial issues.

 

Hi! Interesting discussion which I missed last night. It was a familiar experience visiting a formal garden yesterday as it was beautiful but the cafe was so posh... I hate being ripped off in the cafes. £12 for a ploughmans! And nothing for kids. So they had to have a posh ice cream for lunch And the shop wasn't for practical gardening... it was expensive tat.

I think this whole country has a thing about appearing posh - I read in the paper that no matter what we earn we say we are middle class these days as if being working class is something to be ashamed of. Unless you're chilled out and most gardeners are. After all there's something very grounding about sinking your hands in soil and spreading the zoo poo!

I think the perception of gardens have changed. from something which evolves and grows with the gardener over a number years (7 in my current garden) to something that can be ordered, arrive in a lorry and be plonked down in one day!

I have never been to any of the big flower shows. I'd actually quite like to go to see more than they show on the telly. One day.

 

Having read people's views I think, in essence, there are several types of gardener (or perhaps that should be gardening) ...

Those who just want a pleasant garden to look out on, who wish to grow anything and everything - whether from seed, from seedlings, as bedding plants or to try their hand at grafting etc - or who want a few veggies be it in a window box or large allotment.

Those who grow to sell (as some members here do), for charity.

There are those who are passionate about one particular plant, growing, collecting and learning as much about it as they can, or growing perhaps to enter in shows.

There are the ones who, for whatever reason, want an 'instant' garden and there's nothing wrong in that - lack of time, a physical inability to bend, dig, weed etc., does not suggest that person is any less of a 'gardener' than anyone else.

Then there are what I call the 'Margot Leadbetter' gardeners - they want what they've seen on TV no matter what the cost. Luytens' seats (all the rage for a while, now its Adirondack and/or plastic wicker), water 'features' rather than a pond or bird-bath, a 'rille' as opposed to a stream, the 'Gertrude Jekyll look' instead of a mixed border, or who will buy Jamie Oliver endorsed veggies because, at twice the price of any other veggies, they 'must be better'.

So what's next? Plasticine flowers for whom we have James May to thank? or rusting ironwork and huge cranes in the back garden á lá Diarmuid Gavin - idiotic and grossly expensive tosh, not only endorsed but positively encouraged by the RHS who actually gave him a gold medal for it () and who are the ones solely responsible for trying to turn gardening from a pleasant and rewarding pastime into an elitist 'keeping up with the Joneses' nonsense.

 

'idiotic and grossly expensive tosh, not only endorsed but positively encouraged by the RHS who actually gave him a gold medal for it'

Couldn't agree more

 

Yeah, all right, you've got a point. Put it down to the fact that, not only am I a woman, I'm rapidly becoming the worst kind of woman .... an old one (I take my 'Grumpy' finals soon and have no doubt I shall get full marks!). I just get annoyed when 'they' - who are no better or worse than the rest of us - feel they have some kind of right to dictate what is right or wrong.

And, for heaven's sake, don't even get me started on the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition!

 

Agreed, but maybe thats coz lots of our young poeple have been priced out the housing market, sure there's "social housing" but you're not going to be housed unless you're a young parent with kids, and in that case they dont always have the time for gardening due to their situation with the kid/s, its a catch 22 situation.

Plant Potty.