Container is a modular sideboard system designed by Alain Gilles for Casamania. As if a regular sideboard had been split into different elements, different “containers”.

It is a research on deconstruction and reconstruction. As if a “standard” sideboard with its different storage functionalities had been split into various elements just to be reconstructed in a different, uneven manner.

A research on the architecture of a piece in order to bring forward its construction logic. In a wa

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Monty Don, in a recent TV series on the gardens of Italy, remarked that his friends know he has visited a lot of gardens and often ask him ‘What is the best garden in the world?’. So, while visiting Ninfa, he told us: ‘This is it’. I too have visited a lot of gardens and, though I could not name a ‘best garden’ have ventured a list of The World’s Top Ten Gardens. My list does not include Ninfa. Nor have I been there, but I would like Monty to be questioned or psychoanalysed to discover the reasons for his choice. My theory is that Monty Don is more interested in plants and planting than art and design. I like him as

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The OregonianSalvia patens The OregonianHydrangea ‘Endless Summer’The OregonianAbutilon ‘Nabob’The OregonianDahlia ‘Bishop of Landaff’The OregonianJapanese anenomeThe OregonianPhiladelphus ‘Belle Etoile’Fourth of July usually comes and goes without much fanfare in my life. Full Post…

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Sustainable and theatrical themes at Chelsea help argue the case for an Unofficial Chelsea Fringe Garden Festival

Amongst other things, garden design an arena for fashion. This tempts the critic to look for trends and what I noticed was more an extension of previous trends than anything completely new:

• the visual language of sustainability is becoming stronger, with green walls and green roofs tending towards the norm
• there is more use of food plants each year, as in the above photograph (of a design by Bunny Guiness)
• the interest in green roofs is trending towards high-rise gardens: Sarah Eberle designed an accessible roof garden; B&Q designed a multi-storey garden; Dairmud Gavin hung a garden from a crane [see 2011 Chelsea review]
• the financial trend is to more-and-more money being spent on the show gardens each year

The financial trend reminds me of a previous suggestion: the Official Chelsea Flower Show should be supplemented with an unofficial fringe event.

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