Post-partum
The birth of a book and of a new chapter.
Gardens That Can Save The World, my book about gardens and the hope and goodness they can deliver was published last week. Hurrah! Often these milestones don’t feel as good as you think they’re going to, they arrive weighed down with expectation and then evaporate before you can enjoy them, like a guest leaving a party without saying goodbye. But I am delighted to report this one was not one of those.
We had a little party at Daunt books, the book was (thrillingly) in the window, friends, clients and work friends came, and I said a speech which I actually quite enjoyed and it was great - great to celebrate, great to come to the end of a project that’s been haunting the back of my mind for three years, and great to be able to share the brilliant people and stories I found when writing it. And while there is plenty more to come in terms of events and the never-ending promo (details below) it has left a small window of time in its wake, a small writing-and-thinking-shaped hole which I intend to fill by restarting this.
This, much like before, is going to be my repository for good things I have found - ideas and stories that have direct or often only tangential connections to plants, gardens, ecology and design, things that deliver goodness, beauty and inspiration, often all three. I had to pause, because it seems, there are only so many words I can squeeze out in a month.
Eighteen months ago when I was writing the book, I remember feeling incredibly impatient that it was going to take so long to be out in the world because the stories felt so urgent, so topical to what was going on at the time. Sadly, as it turns out, this is more the case now than then. I am not going to list the ways in which the world has teetered further off its axis, but what is clear, is that hope is in short supply which is incidentally, what the book delivered to me in fresh steaming spadefuls. It revealed to me beyond all doubt that the world a good place, full of good people doing great things and this has a powerful effect on how you view the world. For me, it has been quietly life-changing. Hope is a discipline (a brilliant phrase coined by Mariame Kabe) and one, like my weights (bc I’m 40 and the internet shouted enough at me for long enough) I will be sticking to. The fruits of all this hunting around for hope will be laid out on a platter for you here.
Tulipa turkestanica is my first offering. It appeared this week in the garden and as with all the spring bulbs, there is something of a miracle about it. It is also proof of my thesis on when you become a plant grown up – like olives, capers, anchovies, you only really develop a taste for the sophisticated and true once you’re out of the fishfinger years. The species, untainted by human hand, (which is greedy for lucrative cross breeds and distracting accoutrements like ruffles and doubles and that attract people not insects), is the simplest form. It’s the genuine article, the OG, but it’s only once you’ve had your fill at the pick n mix ice cream sundae that you come round to appreciating the simple beauty of a perfect scoop of vanilla. And the other lovely thing about them which you only discover when you have them in your own garden is that they open and close like little ballerinas performing an exquisitely timed show each day - and that when closed they’re even more gorgeous.
Reading and listening - I have so much to catch you all up on, but I will pace myself. Best quick read recently is the aptly titled Despite It All, A Handbook for Climate Hopefuls by Fred Pearce who has an extremely reassuring number of years of environmental journalism under his belt (40). This not only lends the book genuine heft, but also allows the kind of perspective required if you’re going to say anything useful or insightful about climate change and the environment. Pearce recounts attending an early iteration of COP in Mexico City in 1984 centred on population control, which he cites as one of our big wins - while it might not feel it, globally we are nearly peak population. With this comes all sorts of associated benefits, not least consumption. “According to the U.K.’s Office for National Statistics, Britain’s consumption of materials peaked in 2001 … that is even after allowing for the materials footprint of imported goods”. Hard to believe in a world dominated by Shein and same day delivery, but the thorough analysis of the stats (by Pearce not me) reveal that tide is turning.
A news story that I very much enjoyed recently, so much so that I tried to persuade my husband to stop the business he started three years ago and embark on a 180 pivot to support it (he didn’t). But proof that there are solutions out there, workable, scalable ones that could make vast messy problems a thing of the past within a decade.
A recipe that is very un-me but has promoted silken tofu to a regular buy. Make it thicker for a dip or thinner for a dressing and slosh on everything ( the NYT subscription is one of my new fave subs – operating a one in one out policy on paid subscriptions this year, and the food app alone is worth it. And the Connections game. IYKYK).
Another beneficiary of the O.I.O.O. policy is Noble Rot Magazine - excellent writers, unshackled by the editorial guidelines of mainstream media (I’m not a conspiracy theorist), free to be irreverent, naughty, and often pissed, which works because they know their onions (whilst importantly not giving a tomato). Guest writers like Kiera Knightley talk us through her most memorable dish (it was fishy, messy and included q a lot of lip licking) and Zadie Smith describing her perfect meal (oysters, a martini and steak tartare, predictably cool), plus John Niven as the sardonic agony uncle. A thoroughly good way to spend a Friday evening.
Other things (me me me):
Two very generous write-ups about the book (1, 2) and one that I wrote for the FT about my professional crush Terremoto.
I’m talking at Knepp on 23rd April about the book and what it taught me, with Isabella Tree. It includes drinks, a Q&A and dinner at their Michelin Guide listed Wilding Restaurant. Please come and join so I don’t feel like a lemon.
And if you’re south-west based, I am also talking at Levels Live in Langport Somerset on April 30th 6.30pm, which is an event series run by the brilliant Decca Lang who is also the mastermind behind the magical Craftsman’s Cabin.
I’ll be coming along to Toppings in Bath with Alison from Damson Farm and very much looking forward to it.