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Cookham News Front Page
Exhilarating Evening of Guerilla Gardening
(11 May 2015)
Daily Telegraph
journalist Tim Richardson talks to Cookham and Cookham Dean Horticultural
Society about this year’s Chelsea Fringe
A
new David Beckham hairstyle was the thought that popped into my mind when
I first heard of The
Chelsea Fringe.
I
wasn’t completely wide of the mark because edgy and fashion forward this
hugely inspirational festival of gardening most certainly is.
The
vision of Daily Telegraph journalist Tim Richardson, who also writes ‘about
theatre, food and art and is an irreverent commentator on all matters
pertaining to gardens.’
In
his smartly pressed chinos and appropriately-aged brogues, Tim looks as if
he is someone more at home enjoying a Chelsea show garden rather than in a
Portabello Road pothole but first impressions can be very deceiving.
For The
Chelsea Fringe is the garden enthusiast’s Salon des Refusés,
exhibition of rejects, to Chelsea Flower Show’s Paris Salon as Tim
explained at the outset.
Just
as Édouard Manet's Déjeuner
sur l'herbe was
rejected in 1863 by the French Academy of Fine Arts, so our own Royal
Horticultural Society might find some of Tim’s Chelsea
Fringe exhibits similarly difficult to accept with open arms.
But
there is much to inspire and celebrate in the wonderful, wacky world of
the The
Chelsea Fringe.
Events
from previous years that particularly caught my imagination included the
first Edible Bus Stop where 40 people from the local community got
together to transform a bombed end of terrace site from a dog lavatory to
a delightful landscape. Google
Edible Bus Stop now and you will see them dotted all over London.
Pocket
parks, pothole planting and Cake Sunday Seed Swap are just a few of the
other ideas that originated with the Fringe
and have continued to grow and grow.
The
2015 festival runs from 16th May until 7th June,
before, during and after the Chelsea Flower Show with around 190 gardening
events planned.
From
guided tours of Covent Garden Flower Market, to a Practical Pharmacy
workshop on preparing medicinal herbs in Tower Hamlets Cemetery; from a
wild food guided walk, sustained en route by a nibble on leaves, berries
and roots, to the tranquillity of a Floating Garden in Regents Park; there
really is something for everyone, including those wishing to celebrate the
100th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo!
Events
are concentrated mainly in London but can be found scattered throughout
the UK, including Brighton, Aberdeen and Cambridge. Closer to home, there
will be a Floral Flotilla and Floral Couture evening to enjoy in
Henley-on-Thames.
If
you are travelling abroad this summer Italy, Ljubljana, Australia and
Japan are also hosting events. Visit www.chelseafringe.com
for all the information on what there is to see, where and when.
As a
lover of the arts, the Van Gogh Walk, retracing the artist’s steps from
his lodgings in Brixton to work at the art dealer Goupil & Cie in Covent Garden, is top of my ‘to do’ list.
The
thought of planting up a pothole or two around the lanes of Cookham Dean
is tempting too. It would be
a fitting tribute to what was a wonderfully inspiring evening.
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