A Gentle Intervention: Creating Romantic Gardens in the 21st Century
Discover the secrets to creating a beautiful and romantic garden with Jo Thompson, one of the UK’s leading and best-known garden designers.
Sometimes you find yourself in a garden where you want to stay forever, such is the all-embracing prettiness and the feeling of lushness; a place full of mouthwatering planting, with surprises round every corner. What constitutes a romantic garden will be different for each of us, but for Jo it’s that feeling of abundance, of a story slowly to be revealed.
Whether your garden is large or small, city or country, rooftop or rolling fields, Jo will talk you through some of the key ideas behind creating an atmospheric and romantic garden.
Speaker Bio - Jo Thompson
Jo Thompson is one of the UK’s leading and best-known garden designers. She has won four Gold and five Silver Gilt medals at Chelsea Flower Show, and won the coveted People’s Choice Award at the first RHS Chatsworth Show. She runs a leading architectural-garden design studio, known for creating private and public gardens that are sensitive to their location and history, as well as intelligently planted.
Much of Jo’s childhood was spent in Italy, firstly in Rome, then as a student in Venice, followed by long summers at the family’s Tuscan home nestled in the Sienese hills. The architecture and art of Italy inspires much of her work and her exquisite planting has led her to be considered one of the UK’s leading plantswomen. Current projects include working with Iford Manor in Wiltshire, the restoration of Highgate Cemetery in London with Gustafson Porter + Bowman, and the regeneration of the walled gardens at Water Lane in Kent.
Jo speaks both nationally and internationally, she is a Fellow of the Landscape Institute and a Trustee of Bankside Open Spaces Trust.
Her second book, The Gardener’s Palette was published in 2023 and explores the use of colour to create atmosphere and year-round interest in every garden. The book is available in the Garden Gift Shop.
