Our Camberwell garden open for charity on Sunday 1st September 2024, 11-4:30pm

On 1^st September we will be opening our garden as part of the National Gardens Scheme (NGS) to raise money for charity. 

The NGS says of our garden:

An exotic garden full of the exuberance of late summer, inspired by travel in Southeast Asia. A lush and naturalistic jungle of big leafed plants, bold colours and shapes including cannas, bananas, bamboos, dahlias, mature tetrapanax and towering paulownias.

Huge ‘hidden’ garden, created in 2010 from buying derelict land which had been the bottom halves of two neighbour’s gardens gives the garden an unexpected size. Three ponds, a productive area and contemporary sunken terrace full of pampered prized plants.

We deliver on the ‘wow’ factor with visitors being surprised by the scale of the garden and getting lost in the exotica. The garden changes and improves every year as the plants grow bigger and the feel gets ‘junglier’.

Since first opening for the NGS in 2011 the garden has changed radically. At that time the top garden was still partially derelict and being cleared. Planting was mostly annuals and pumpkins! It took a year to clear the rubble, brambles and hops. We filled 5 skips with rubble and broke 20 spades and forks in the process. Many visitors have kept coming back to see the transformation.

The lower lawn has lots of seating (30+) and hidden corners give space to sit and enjoy. Renowned for the plant sale, teas and home-made cakes.

Live music! All being well the Secret Life Sax quartet will play in the afternoon

Last admission at 4:30.

See more about the development of the garden on my blog: https://www.alternative-planting.blogspot.com

See the full details on the NGS website here 

Where are we? We are at 24 Grove Park, Camberwell, London, SE5 8LH. Aim for the Chadwick Rd end of Grove Park. Peckham Rye or Denmark Hill Stns, both 10 min walk. Good street parking.

How much does it cost? Where does the money go? £5 entry. All monies raised go to the NGS whom them distribute to different charities. This year they donated £3.4million. Core beneficiaries include Macmillan Cancer Support, Marie Curie, Hospice UK and The Queens Nursing Institute. 

How good is the cake? I can confirm it is very good!

How accessible is the garden? The garden is on a slight slope/different levels and so does include some steps. Some paths are uneven and made of wood chip, others gravel. Sadly, we are not wheelchair accessible. 

Some pictures to entice you to come!

Watch the video the lovely Wayne made when he visited last year

I hope you can come and visit!

July!

 How it is the end of July?

As the year whizzes by the garden gets more and more jungly! It is looking to be a good year as the wet and the heat has then helped get things going. Perhaps the best year yet!

The battle against the wet, slugs and snails: I know this is an issue for everyone this year as the mild winter and wet spring has meant we have a plague of monopods! This has made it very hard to grow some things such as dahlias, Cleome. The wet also seems to have rotted a lot of things like my tree dahlias (RIP).

Love for begonias: this continues to grow, particularly for hardy begonias. My current favourite is Begonia Torsa a  hybrid between a Bhutanese species and B. grandis. Its leaves can get up to 45cm! currently it is romping away. I will have lots of these available at my plant sale.

Thinning bamboos: This has been a great year for bamboo as they have all had a great flush of new culms. You do need to keep thinning them to keep them looking good. I also strip the lower leaves to expose the culms. When thinning them it is amazing how many culms you can take out and it feels like I have been filling our brown bin with bamboo every week for months!

Propagating a go-go: Having taken on a roof garden project at one of the hospitals I work at I am propagating a lot of plants! There are lots for this year’s plant sale.

Need more mulch and compost! The more I garden the more I realise how so much of the success of everything is down to the soil. I also always underestimate how much compost I need. This year I will have got through about 40 bags of compost and 15 of well rotted manure. However, with the soil now being so dry I realise how much more I could mulch. I have also used 20kg of blood fish and bone and a giant tub of pelleted chicken manure.

Hardy Colocasia’s: This year I am hoping is the year I crack Colocasia’s! I love these plants as they are so exotic, but in general I am rubbish at growing them. They can be hard to overwinter and seem to take ages to get going. This year I have got ‘Pink china’ (top)and am on my 3^rd year of growing  Colocasia gaoligongensis  (bottom). I am trying to keep them well watered and give them lots of fertilizer as I know they are hungry plants.