Saturday, 29th November 2025:  Gardens are mostly about sex, death and deliciousness...(Celebrity Lecture ALL TICKETS NOW SOLD)

Saturday, 3rd January 2026:  My Woodland Garden: A Robinsonian Dream

Please note this lecture is at 7:30pm on zoom, held jointly with Tendershoots Club

The story of his woodland garden, its influences, plants and musings on design. Lots of hellebores and snowdrops appropriate to the season.

Edward is Head Gardener of a large country garden in Sussex. Course tutor on the Art and Craft of Gardening at Great Dixter and lecturer at the English Gardening School, Chelsea Physic Garden for over 20 years. Lover of wild places and believer in the importance of gardening as a craft.

Saturday, 31st January 2026:  Bourne to be a Galanthophile

A fascinating talk with stories behind various galanthus, some delightful anecdotes and plenty of information about growing galanthus. Not to be missed!

Val Bourne is an award-winning garden writer, organic gardener and lecturer and she gardens on the wind-swept Cotswolds at Spring Cottage - high above Bourton-on-the-Water in Gloucestershire. Her third of an acre garden is managed without using chemicals - something Val has always believed in. She is a hands-on gardener and a committed plantaholic. She also happens to be the new President of The Hardy Plant Society and a member of our Western Counties Group.

Saturday, 28th February 2026:  Pruning Garden Trees- Inspiring Confidence

We are delighted that Nick will entertain and instruct us on how to prune trees (including fruit trees) demonstrating using live material, filmed up close so that those not sitting on the front row can see the fine detail in all its glory.

For the last 50 years, Nick Dunn has been a cornerstone of British horticulture, establishing Frank P Matthews' reputation for exceptional British trees across the UK and beyond in his role as Managing Director. His passion for trees and growing is second to none and his leadership extends far beyond the nursery grounds. He has been a key figure in national horticultural societies, including the RHS, HDC and NSA, supporting the gardening and top fruit sector and protecting plant health across the UK. Nick holds the RHS Victoria Medal of Honour, awarded to British horticulturists deserving of special honour for horticultural excellence and personal endeavour.

Saturday, 28th March 2026:  My Fascination with Alpines and The Arley Arboretum Project

Gail became fascinated with alpines when she joined the Alpine Garden Society in 1989 whilst living in Kent.

She will talk us through her experiences of growing alpines in her own gardens, at the AGS demonstration garden near Pershore, and more recently as a volunteer rejuvenating the alpine beds at Arley Arboretum.

She will share with us why we should grow alpines and encourage us all to give them a go!

Saturday, 25th April 2026:  Clematis: The Great Social Climbers

In his illustrated talk on clematis Marcel will discuss and demonstrate the difficulties of propagation with top tips to help us succeed in growing them well, inspirational combinations with other plants and some of the best varieties to grow now (both old and new) including species clematis.

Marcel is a renowned plantsman, exhibiting at all the major RHS Shows. He owns a nursery in Chippenham where he specialises in clematis and climbers only. He will be bringing plants for sale and taking orders ahead of the day. There’s always room for one more…

Saturday, 30th May 2026:  Garden Resilience Part 1: Drought

Our climate is changing and our gardens must change with it. How can we adapt our gardening ways and planting style to cope with prolonged dry weather?

Pip is a landscape designer with over 17 years of experience working within the horticultural industry. Trained to degree level in horticulture at Pershore College and with an MA in Landscape Architecture with distinction, he’s held the post of Head Gardener at several private and public gardens, most recently at the highly acclaimed Wollerton Old Hall in Shropshire.

Saturday, 27th June 2026:  Succession Planting

Planning a border and garden so you always have something flowering is a challenge. In this talk we will look at plant choices through the year that can work together to give interest in all seasons.

Steve and his partner Lou Dowle will be bringing plants for sale. Steeped in the practical art of gardening, Steve uses direct observation and his love of the natural world to supplement his technical skills as a grower, breeder, horticulturalist and arboriculturalist. A former head gardener, Steve and Lou now own No Name Nursery in Kent.

Accolades include appointment to the RHS Herbaceous Committee and membership of the RHS plant trial forums; multiple RHS Gold medal winner; "Best in show" Hampton court 2019. Steve has appeared on TV several times including Gardeners World.

Previous RHS trials include Zinnia (Chairman), Cosmos, New Guinea Impatiens, Dahlia, Zantedeschia, Calibrachoa, Agapanthus and Nepeta. Currently involved in trialling Dahlia and Chairman of the Baptisia trial.

Saturday, 25th July 2026:  Stunning Summer Displays

How to use planting combinations and maintenance tips and tricks to create impactful summer herbaceous borders with hardy perennials and much more.

Samantha will be bringing plants for sale.

Samantha trained as a geologist but her passion soon morphed into the world of plants. She studied at Pershore College, Birmingham Botanic Gardens and RHS Wisley, Kew and at Great Dixter.

She went to work alongside John Massey, helping to look after his Hepatica collection at Ashwood Nurseries. This became one of her passions, alongside specialist alpines and a new breeding program with Roscoea. She now works alongside husband Nigel growing plants for sale and developing their own garden.

Saturday, 29th August 2026:  Hydrangeas - A Gentle Obsession

Hydrangeas fell out of fashion in the late 90s but are now right back in the mainstream. With the introduction of new species, we now have hydrangeas in a range of colours from white through green, pink, blue to the deepest purple and wine, flowering over six months and peaking at that difficult time of late summer into autumn.

This talk covers how to grow, prune, propagate and colour manage hydrangeas and how to cut and dry the flowers. It introduces a personal selection of varieties from 12 species at Highfield Farm, plus a few others and includes where to see them at their best and where to buy them.

Roger has travelled the world for work, gardening alongside his wife who had the passion for plants. Over time he absorbed her enthusiasm and knowledge and they opened their former garden in Cheshire and their current garden Highfield Farm for Macmillan via NGS. Roger is quite the hydrangea expert and a very accomplished speaker.

Saturday, 26th September 2026:  Dierama: The Harebells of Africa

Ruth will talk to us about Eastern Cape flora and Dierama: where they come from, the different types, heights and colours, their history and how to successfully grow this elegant plant in the UK.

Ruth has been collecting and growing Dierama (commonly known as Angels' Fishing Rods) in her cottage garden in Staffordshire for the last 15 years. She now has 31 species and 23 cultivars and was awarded Plant Heritage National Collection status in 2016. In July 2018 her collection was featured on BBC Gardeners’ World.

Saturday, 31st October 2026:  Potty Time - A Spectacular Year in Pots

With tips and hints for stunning pot work Harriet will show us how to grow vibrant, outstanding and unusual things in pots throughout the year.

Working at Whichford Pottery for 15 years, Harriet has become a renowned planter of pots! At Whichford she planned, planted and maintained awesome displays of pots all year round and provided text and photographs for two of their beautiful books. She reckons that she must have planted about 7000 pots during that time…

Saturday, 28th November 2026:  The Twelve Plants of Christmas

Timothy needs no introduction, having enthralled and delighted us with his erudition and enthusiasm over the years. He is a lecturer in Plant Sciences at Oxford University and a Fellow of The Linnaean Society. Prepare to learn and laugh in equal measure.

This is a very personal take on the plants that feature in the celebration of Christmas as well as those plants that turn up in the Bible account of the birth of Jesus. Apart from the pear tree in which sat the partridge, there are no plants in the 12 days of Christmas according to the folk song. Sadly, even that reference is erroneous, because partridges are ground dwelling birds. And yet at Christmas we are surrounded by plants. This talk puts the record straight and rewrites the plant-blind zoocentric song replacing partridges with poinsettias, and maids with mistletoe.