Growing Tastes Kitchen Garden
The RHS Growing Tastes Kitchen Garden was designed by Michael Balston and Marie-Louise Agius of Balston & Company for the 2008 Hampton Court Palace Flower Show. They worked with the team at RHS Wisley to create three fruit and vegetable gardens inspired by Asian, Mediterranean and traditional British cuisine. All the plants displayed in the Growing Tastes Kitchen Garden can be grown in the UK.
The Asian garden featured delicious varieties of Asian vegetables and herbs such as pak choi, azuki beans, Chinese celery and Japanese turnips. Large bespoke woks were used as novel containers and were alive with vibrant colours of chillies, day lilies and chrysanthemums set under the canopies of Loquat and Persimmon trees.
In the Mediterranean garden, terracotta pots were surrounded by beds filled with artichokes, Romaine lettuces, aubergines, fennel and radicchio. Olive, fig and peach trees enhanced the Mediterranean ambience of this garden.
The British garden featured familiar varieties of vegetables such as swede, beetroot, leeks and potatoes set amongst baskets made from woven willow overflowing with pelargoniums, marigolds and nasturtiums. Espaliers of apples and pears formed a backdrop for delicious gooseberries, blackcurrants, redcurrants and raspberries.
