From April to October, on the first Tuesday of each month you can visit the Orchard Plant Library and Barn Garden from 10.00am–1.00pm. All money raised from ticket sales will go directly to the Serge Hill Project which is a not for profit CIC (Community Interest Company).

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (October 2023)

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (April 2024)

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (May 2024)

We are delighted to announce our first workshops in the Plant Library and we would love to see you there. Serge Hill Project CIC is partnering with 

 to offer three study days at Serge Hill, led by Tom Stuart-Smith, Sue Stuart-Smith, Noel Kingsbury, Annie Guilfoyle, and Millie Souter, from early to late summer.

8.May - Workshop 1 - Bulbs and early summer perennials with Sue Stuart Smith, Millie Souter, and Annie Guilfoyle

Garden Masterclass at The Plant Library (1 of 3)

The day will start with a talk by Vicki Hird author of 'Rebugging The Planet'. 


Vicki will support students to catch insects in pooters for identification. She will discuss the significance of the insects and importance in the ecology of the garden.


This will be followed by a drawing workshop with artist Henny Beaumont. Henny will instruct the students how to look at, understand and capture the form of the insects in our pooters. Additionally or alternatively, students could draw or take rubbings from leaves, bark or stones from the surrounding gardens with support and agreement. The aim will be to create designs to use for our plates.

We will the release insects back into the garden.

In the afternoon, Brigit Connolly and Henny Beaumont will build on the work done in the morning to help the students create ceramic ‘Pallissy Plates’ working either directly with clay or air dried clay. Students who prefer to working in 2D will be supported to develop their drawings on paper. The drawings created by students will be formatted and printed onto ceramic plates and cups.

Insect Week: Sunnyside Rural Trust Workshop

James Alexander-Sinclair digs beneath the mulch with Mark Fane and Peter Clay of Crocus together with Tom Stuart-Smith to find out about their long collaboration at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. This began with a garden for Chanel in 1998 and ends – for the time being- with their garden for the National Gardens Scheme and Project Giving Back at Chelsea 2024. Honor Reekie who worked with Tom on the 2024 garden will also share a few choice insights into the making of the garden this year.

Chelsea Talk

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (June 2024)

Bring the garden inside through a series of exploratory floral masterclasses at The Apple House, within the Serge Hill Project for Gardening, Creativity, and Health. Hazel Gardiner, passionate floral artist, gardener, and broadcaster will be teaching a day of workshops celebrating cut flowers and the mindful, healing, practice of floral design. Your day starts with a tour of the private cutting garden at Tom Stuart-Smith's Plant Library where Hazel will be joined by its Head Gardener, Millie Souter.

This rare opportunity to explore the field for fascinating insight into curating and growing a wide selection of floral varieties. You will also be able to select and pick a selection of flowers. Returning to the beautiful Apple House, your harvested flowers will be used in the first workshop of the day. Hazel will teach how to create a striking hand-tied bouquet in her signature naturalistic style with additional flowers harvested from the cutting garden and surrounding Serge Hill site. Once completed, your bouquet will be lovingly wrapped for you to take home and enjoy.

After a nourishing lunch, Hazel will demonstrate how to create an impactful and imaginative vessel arrangement using sustainable foam-free techniques showcasing the unique and varied varieties grown in the Plant Library. You’ll gain insight into Hazel’s design techniques using the principles of colour, texture, and structure. There will be ample opportunity to ask questions, and Hazel will share her insider care tips and knowledge throughout the session. Afterward, you’re invited to take a relaxing self-guided tour of the garden to further explore and learn about the initiative.

This one-day masterclass is a true celebration of seasonality and a unique opportunity to experience and learn about the Serge Hill Project, meet the team, and nurture your creativity in its stunning surroundings. Workshops are suitable for all skill levels; all materials are provided. Please note, the cutting garden tour is weather-dependent; please wear suitable footwear for potential inclement weather.

All money raised from ticket sales will go directly to the Serge Hill Project which is a not for profit CIC (Community Interest Company).

Floral Masterclass with Hazel Gardiner

Tania and Jamie's talk will explore the flora of the Peloponnese where Jamie leads springtime tours from a property overlooking the Messenian gulf and the Taygetos mountain. This is also where Tania has created a garden of predominantly Mediterranean plants. Their talk will look at the wild wider landscape and its influence on planting choices for the garden.

Tania & Jamie Compton: Gardening & Plant Hunting in Greece

Since my early teens, I have made six gardens for myself and my family.The first was foisted onto my long-suffering parents who raised the white flag and let me get on with it. Now for the first time since that garden I have the luxury of time and the largest space thus far to play with. The new garden is part done; the field, with its wildflower meadows, and many closely planted “orchard like” trees (I prefer “coppice wood pasture”) is now in place if of course rather raw. As I write the garden around the house has most of its new bones in place, the contractors are soon to depart, but with no planting other than the trees and shrubs that have lived there for at least 70 years.

Despite no longer being in gainful employment, I cannot step out of the shoes of educator-flier of kites, that I have occupied for the past 40 years. As ever I wanted to make something that was in some way new or at least experimental that might be of interest to others. To boost biodiversity, to respond positively and creatively to climate change, plant lots of different trees (lignin therapy), in the right places; and beneath these, restore an area of meadowland to what it might once have been or better. Perhaps a stepping stone to encourage others to follow suit? I also wanted to have some fun, to choreograph great seasonal drama on the stage that is the garden, my home version of the “wow factor” that has been the hallmark of my life’s work. To do this you need numbers for each moment in time. A single Dodecatheon or Begonia grandis is a fine thing but when you lay 500 of each across a garden landscape a different world is brought into being. It's rather early days but I do hope some of my plans may be of interest to you.

James Hitchmough's New Garden

Extra date released, with the option to purchase Student Tickets. You can visit the Orchard Plant Library and Barn Garden from 10.00am–1.00pm. All money raised from ticket sales will go directly to the Serge Hill Project which is a not for profit CIC (Community Interest Company).

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (18 June 2024)

‘I want people to go ‘wow’ at the romantic abundance as soon as they arrive.’ Kate Stuart-Smith

The garden at Serge Hill has been in the Stuart-Smith family for nearly a hundred years. When Kate Stuart-Smith took it over in the 1990’s she was faced with a series of challenges. How to make a place your own when it is a much-loved family garden - albeit with the sensibility of an older generation? How to edit out plants you have always disliked and yet be sure to hang on to plants which you may regret losing? Do you dare to remove a mature tree or a carefully nurtured hedge? What will happen if you simply stop the meticulous spraying that has kept the paths crisp and clear for generations?

Sister of landscape designer Tom whose renowned Barn Garden is across the way, fellow designer Kate Stuart-Smith will be discussing how she took on the family plot thoughtfully - but with a sense of adventure - and created a garden whose surging, fairy tale profusion does indeed make the visitor gasp.

In this special event, guests will have the opportunity to visit Kate's Garden at Serge Hill House as well as the Orchard Plant Library and Barn Garden, from 5 to 6 pm.

Kate Stuart-Smith & Non Morris: On the Garden at Serge Hill House

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (July 2024)

According to Peter, with inspiration from the wild it´s possible to create low maintenance plantings with high diversity, in almost any environment. Plantings that don´t need irrigation but have high ornamental values with continuous flowering through the seasons and beautiful winter values. Plantings that are important for biodiversity and can stand or even benefit from a more extreme future climate.

In his talk, Peter will show some examples and talk about the thoughts behind some of his public plantings, as well as from Klinta Trädgård; his private garden and nursery.

What factors affect a planting and how is it possible to to turn the most problematic conditions to an excellent starting point? How to read an area, take advantage of the different factors and create possibilities for plants to thrive. How to make sustainable plantings with high plant diversity. Peter believes that hot dry places in cities can be transformed to important environments for biodiversity. But in urban areas where many people live, the function and the aesthetic values are as or even more important. It´s also possible to combine all of this with stormwater management and other challenges. Maintenance is always the key factor to success. A planting should solve problems, not create them.

Peter Korn: Growing in Sand

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (16 July 2024)

 to offer three study days at Serge Hill, led by Tom Stuart-Smith, Sue Stuart-Smith, Noel Kingsbury, and Millie Souter, from early to late summer.

24.July - Workshop 2 – Summer perennials

The focus for this second workshop is on summer perennials such as Amsonia, Salvia, Phlomis, Umbelifers and Santolina. Tom Stuart-Smith and Noel Kingsbury will be on hand, along with Millie Souter. Students can choose a genus to study and observe and compare species along with reviewing and observing qualities for design purposes. The workshop continues with observational drawings which can be used in design proposals and 3D visuals. Analysing plant choices, communicating using drawings, studying plant combinations and making suggestions, through critique and rationale.

There will be a tour of Tom and Sue’s garden with Derek Hunter, the focus on this day will be the west garden.

Garden Masterclass at the Plant Library (2 of 3)

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (Aug 2024)

'For me garden design is not just about plants, it is about emotion, atmosphere, a sense of contemplation’ – Piet Oudolf

A rare opportunity to hear the pioneering Dutch plantsman, nurseryman and author, at the forefront of the New Perennial movement Piet Oudolf reflecting on the gardens and plants that have defined his career so far.

An Evening with Piet Oudolf

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (Sept 2024)

‘Biodiversity isn’t about just a few select species, but an integrated world with one element impacting on the other’ – Fergus Garrett

Spend the evening in The Apple House with Fergus Garrett, Head Gardener of one of the UK’s most loved gardens, Great Dixter, as he shares insights about the practices, plants and people that have contributed to make Great Dixter such an extraordinarily biodiverse garden; one that is much richer in biodiversity than the countryside surrounding it.

Fergus Garrett on Biodiversity at Great Dixter

25 September - Workshop 3 – Late summer perennials and grasses.

In the morning Tom Stuart-Smith will be sharing some of the best-performing late summer flowering perennials, exploring two selections of plants: those grown in sand and those grown in green waste.


Then after lunch Head Gardener Millie Souter will lead the workshop which includes Euphorbia, Aster, Kalimeris, Grasses and Actaea. Students can choose a genus to study and observe and compare species along with reviewing and observing qualities for design purposes. The workshop continues with observational drawings which can be used in design proposals and 3D visuals. Analysing plant choices, communicating using drawings, studying plant combinations and making suggestions, through critique and rationale.

There will be a tour of Tom and Sue’s garden with Derek Hunter, the focus on this day will be the prairie and the Cornus kousa grove.

Garden Masterclass at The Plant Library (3 of 3)

Plant Library and Barn Garden Visit (Oct 2024)

Hosted by Tom Stuart-Smith Studio, Working with Earth: Architecture and Landscape is a two day symposium of forward-thinking discussions, shared knowledge, practical demonstrations and garden tours. It brings together a community of some of the most innovative, creative and acclaimed minds in sustainable Architecture and Landscape Architecture working in the UK today.

Speakers and demonstrators include Material Cultures (George Massoud and Paloma Gormley), Feilden Fowles (Edmund Fowles), Muirne Kate Dineen, Iza Thomson and Bee Rowan, Local Works (Loretta Bosence and Ben Bosence), Sarah Price, Cleve West, Tom Massey, Tom Stuart-Smith, Ben Stuart-Smith and Millie Souter.

Working with Earth: Architecture and Landscape, a two day symposium

The Safe Green Space: Gardens and Health is a one-day symposium on the power of gardens to heal hosted by the Serge Hill Project and 

Speakers include: De Sue Stuart-Smith, Tom Stuart-Smith, Arit Anderson, Dr Richard Claxton, Dr Olivia Chapple, Keely Siddiqui Charlick, Ashley Edwards, Joe Darrell, Ruth Madder, Millie Souter.

‘Everything that happens in a garden takes place in slow time; the flowers, shrubs and trees simply get on with growing quietly at their own pace and so it is with people’ - Dr Sue Stuart-Smith

The Safe Green Space: Gardens and Health is a one-day symposium hosted by the Serge Hill Project and Gardening4Health, at the new Apple House venue, set in the heart of a unique Plant Library of 1500 herbaceous perennials.

Bringing together some of the leading lights within horticultural therapy and garden design, speakers will explore the many ways that nature-based interventions can be beneficial to health and well-being.

The Safe Green Space: Gardens and Health, a one day symposium

“There’s not a day in the year that something can’t be propagated.” – Anya Lautenbach

Spend the evening in The Apple House with bestselling author Zia Allaway and Instagram’s propagation queen Anya Lautenbach, to celebrate the launch of Anya’s brilliant new book The Money-Saving Garden Year: A Month-by-Month Guide to a Great Garden that Costs Less.

With a new gardening year ahead, Anya will be in conversation with gardening writer, author, editor and long-standing Plant Library volunteer, Zia Allaway, about her best advice on what to do in the garden each month, while keeping budget in mind, to get the most out of your plot all year round. During the talk Anya will offer practical advice on everything from when to plant seedlings to the best time to propagate different plants, as well as demonstrating some easy propagation techniques. Afterwards, Anya will be signing copies of her new book, which will be for sale at the event by local independent bookseller Books On The Hill. The ideal gift for your Christmas list.

Anya Lautenbach & Zia Allaway: From Propagation to Planting - The Money Saving Garden Year with Instagram’s Anya The Garden Fairy

With a career that spans 30 years, winner of a Gold Medal and Best Portfolio in the 2024 RHS Botanical Art and Photography show, internationally renowned photographer Andrea Jones will be hosting this garden and plant photography workshop which explores the rich late autumn planting in the gardens at and around the Serge Hill Project, celebrating the soft tones and textures within.

Across the gardens of the Plant Library, Tom and Sue Stuart-Smith’s Barn Garden and Kate Stuart-Smith’s Serge Hill there will be a wide selection of interesting plants to photograph; individually and in combination.

Photographing Gardens & Plants Throughout the Year: Capturing Autumn's Subtle Colours, Tones and Textures with Andrea Jones

Come join us for a fun, relaxing festive celebration creating wreaths or garlands in our stunning new orchard venue, The Apple House.

This workshop will guide you step by step through how to make a sustainable festive garland or wreath using just wire and seasonal fresh foliage from the grounds of Serge Hill decorated with dried seed heads from the Plant Library, ribbons, and home dried fruit. At the end of the workshop you will take home your masterpiece!

No experience or equipment necessary, but if you have some secateurs and gardening gloves do bring them along. 

The workshop includes refreshments and cake. 

Festive Wreath Making Workshop

"Il faut cultiver son jardin."
—Voltaire

More than 130 years after it was established, inspirational landscape architect and plantswoman Anja Maubach runs her great-grandfather’s perennial plant nursery near Düsseldorf, augmenting his legacy with her own gardening philosophy and a mindful appreciation of the rhythms of life, community and the seasons. Her great-grandfather George Arends was the breeder of a number of cultivars including Aconitum x arendsii, Astilbe x arendsii, Sedum “Autumn Joy”, Hosta sieboldiana “Elegans”.

In this afternoon talk Anja draws on decades of experience to share a number of inspiring ways to work with gardens and landscapes as energy fields, where both plants and people will grow and thrive. She discusses how the process of bringing your own garden, or those of your clients, to life is also a journey into the processes of your own “inner garden”; combining spiritual rigour with horticultural excellence.

Drawing on the experience of her long career, Anja believes that in order to make projects grow, there needs to be a connection to the biography of the site or to the biography of the people - and in this talk seeks to answer the following questions:

Why do we feel attracted to the ‘energy’ of certain places?

How can we create spaces that harness their power for self healing?

How can we create connections between the garden and the gardener?


Ticketholders can explore Tom Stuart-Smith's Plant Library of 1500 herbaceous perennials and bulbs after the event. 

Friday Afternoon Talk: Grow Where You Are with Anja Maubach 

On specific Tuesdays through April to October you can visit Tom and Sue Stuart-Smith's Plant Library and Barn Garden between 10.00am–1.00pm. 

Money raised from ticket sales will go directly to The Serge Hill Project for Gardening Creativity and Health, which is a not-for-profit Community Interest Company, bringing schools, community groups, mental health groups and those in need into contact with nature. 

Please note - this is a 2 garden visit only. On 6, 20 May 3, 17 June and 1 July only you can do a 3 garden visit when an additional neighbouring garden, Serge Hill opens. 

The Plant Library and The Barn Garden Visit (1 April 2025)

‘Jinny’s work pulls you into a romantic wonderland of natural beauty’ - Fergus Garett

Using the title of her successful recent book as a springboard, in this talk eminent landscape designer and writer Jinny Blom, draws on over 20 years of experience to reveal her highly individual approach to garden design; reflecting on the references, ideas and experiences that have shaped her design practice’s distinct philosophy and multidisciplinary approach. Her work, which focusses on conservation and the best use of land, has been celebrated internationally.

Sharing projects, collaborations and insights from across her career, Jinny will the explore complex constellation of ideas, experiences, thoughts and senses that explore what makes a garden.


She will expose the idea of the garden across time and cultures, and the alchemy and processes of transformation that we invest in altering our landscapes.

Much like the ingredients to make a garden itself, the talk will combine the practical and the scientific with the natural, the human, the philosophical and the arts.


An informative and inspirational evening for the widest audience of gardeners, garden designers and garden lovers.

Hosted in The Apple House eco-barn, in an old orchard, guests can explore Tom Stuart-Smith’s Plant Library of over 1500 herbaceous perennials and bulbs ahead of the talk and enjoy a drink while they do so.

Jinny Blom on What Makes A Garden

Polly Nicholson, specialist flower grower, tulip expert and author of one of 2024’s most lauded gardening books The Tulip Garden, leads this practical half day workshop in The Plant Library and Apple House looking at everything you need to know to select, collect, grow, cut and arrange species tulips, with an additional look at rare and annual tulips.

This workshop will offer inspiration, guidance and practical instruction for tulip lovers, florists, gardeners and garden designers on how to optimise growing one of the world’s most beloved blooms just as the perennial, species varieties start to bloom.

The day will start with a presentation on the wide range of tulips Polly grows at Blacklands, Nicholson’s beautiful, six-acre English country garden, through which you will discover a unique collection of rare and covetable tulips—the largest private collection of historic varieties in the United Kingdom. Polly will highlight the best species tulips, as well as some historical and rare varieties, to utilise in different settings; from naturalising them in herbaceous beds or grass through to container planting.

This will be followed by a practical session on creating perennial plantings of tulips, both species and naturalised annuals, that can be left year-on-year, including Polly’s favourite varieties and combinations, as well as how to plant and care for them based on her experiences.

Attendees also get time to explore Tom Stuart-Smith's famous Plant Library, home to over 1500 perennials and bulbs. 

The Tulip Garden Workshop: Growing, Collecting and Cutting Species Rare and Annual Varieties Year-On-Year with Polly Nicholson

The Plant Library and The Barn Garden Visit (15 April 2025)

A special opening with 3 gardens. Visit Tom and Sue Stuart-Smith's renowned Plant Library of over 1500 perennials and shrubs and Barn Garden as well as Kate Stuart-Smith's neighbouring stunning Serge Hill Garden from 10.00am–1.00pm. 

All profits raised from ticket sales will go directly to The Serge Hill Project which is a not for profit CIC (Community Interest Company) which works to bring local schools, youth organisations, mental health charities and community groups into contact with nature for the benefits of their health, wellbeing and creativity.

Visit 3 Gardens: The Plant Library, The Barn Garden and Serge Hill (6 May 2025)

In this first of our series of practical propagation workshops, join plantswoman and propagation expert Derry Watkins of the garden, nursery and online seed shop Special Plants to learn everything you need to know about taking cuttings in Spring. Learn the practices and principles of how new plants grow from cuttings, when and how to take them, as well as compost, timing and aftercare. Then, practice the techniques using plants from The Plant Library of over 1500 perennials and bulbs, which you will take with you to grow on at home.


Each workshop includes refreshments, materials and handouts and can be booked individually or together as a course.


All profits go directly to fund the work of the Serge Hill Project for Gardening, Creativity and Health Community Interest Company.

Propagation Workshop Series: Spring Propagation with Derry Watkins (Special Plants Nursery)

We are delighted to announce our second collaboration with Garden Masterclass for this exciting new planting design course, which runs across three sessions and seasons. 

This course is comprised of three individual study days, spread over the seasons. Participants spend time in Tom Stuart-Smith's Plant Library comprising over 1500 perennials and bulbs, at the Serge Hill Project in order to research and create a personal, plant combinations portfolio, finishing the course with an invaluable resource for future projects.

Participants will be given four different sites at Serge Hill to create planting plans, using plants from The Plant Library. Project work would include researching the conditions for each of these sites and creating a planting plan for each one, presented in their portfolio.

Please note that it is essential to attend each day – they cannot be purchased individually. 

Garden Masterclass Planting Design Course at The Plant Library 

Visit 3 Gardens: The Plant Library, The Barn Garden and Serge Hill (20 May 2025- Morning)

Visit 3 Gardens: The Plant Library, The Barn Garden and Serge Hill (3 June 2025)

Join us for a botanic calligraphic workshop timed to coincide with the Iris flowering season with 

the inaugural Serge Hill Project Artist in Residence

, Anne McKenzie. Over the course of three engaging hours, you'll have the chance to explore the art of Shodo, Japanese Calligraphy, from its roots in pictographs through formal, semi-cursive, and cursive scripts. Anne will demonstrate botanic calligraphy, a unique fusion of Shodo and Botanic Art and will have on display an example of a recently completed banner. 

Guests will then be invited to pick a specimen in the plant library. A short series of upper body stretches to awaken your creative spirit will prepare you for the brush exercises and help to focus on the breath. We will apply Shodo techniques to brushing the plant specimens several times. 

The final piece will be brushed on a piece of shoji paper complete with a wooden batten and clear string for instant hanging ready for you to take home and display. A hearty vegetarian lunch will also be served, providing a perfect opportunity to socialise and build a community of art and nature enthusiasts. 

This workshop offers a unique opportunity to experience another way of observing, being with, describing, and emotionally expressing the beauty of plants. Through this meditative practice, you will cultivate a clear mind, calm breath, and a deep appreciation of the present moment. All materials are provided, and no prior art experience is necessary, making it an accessible and enriching experience for everyone. Please wear comfortable clothes to enjoy the creative and relaxing process.

All profits go directly to fund the work of the Serge Hill Project for Gardening, Creativity and Health Community Interest Company.

Botanical Calligraphy Workshop with Anne McKenzie, Artist in Residence

Leading landscape designer Marian Boswall has worked on some of the UK's most ambitious and innovative regenerative landscape projects. Join Marian in conversation with the Serge Hill Project Director and bestselling author Sue Stuart-Smith in the Apple House for a trail-blazing conversation drawing on, and celebrating the publication of, Marian's new book The Kindest Garden: A Practical Guide to Regenerative Gardening, published this Spring.

A step-up from sustainable gardening, which focuses on minimising our impact on the earth, regenerative gardening is about making an active contribution to the health of the planet: nurturing and replenishing biodiversity and ourselves through our gardens. Whether you have a shady patio, a large plot of land or a windowsill – you can make an impact.

Drawing on lessons from forward-thinking farmers, foresters, re-wilders and nature itself, The Kindest Garden will show you how to make a garden that is both a beautiful sanctuary and a place where nature can thrive. Come to understand the key elements of a garden (soil, water, ecosystems, materials, energy and planting) on a deeper level and discover how to work with each one to co-create a garden that helps makes positive change. Apply in-depth practical knowledge to your projects and plan your planting to nourish the soil, yourself and others.

With practical takeaways, and drawing on a wealth of real-life projects, this evening will be perfect and full of inspiration for eco-conscious gardeners and designers who want to make a real difference.

Marian Boswall in conversation with Sue Stuart-Smith on The Kindest Garden: A Practical Guide to Regenerative Gardening

Visit 3 Gardens: The Plant Library, The Barn Garden and Serge Hill (17 June 2025)

We are excited to announce the second of our one-day symposiums at The Serge Hill Project: A Safe Green Space: Nature and Play.


Taking place on Wednesday 18 June 2025 in The Apple House eco barn, this event explores a topic at the heart of The Serge Hill Project's mission; the transformative relationship between nature, gardens, creativity, wellbeing and play. 

Designed for outdoor educators, playworkers, health professionals, teachers, horticultural therapists, gardeners, garden designers and anyone passionate about the intersection of nature and wellbeing, this symposium will uncover the profound connection between nature and play through discussions, practical workshops and presentations. 

Just some of the ideas that will be explored on the day:  

Why do children need to play and how does nature facilitate this?

What factors are responsible for the demise of play and how can reintroduce more play into children lives?

How can our playgrounds be more open to the idea of wildness?

How can play be integrated into public and private garden designs?

Which countries set the gold standard for approaches to play and how does the UK compare? 

With an inspiring line up of speakers -from playworkers to psychotherapists to artists- this symposium will delve deep into the impact nature play has on our development, creativity and wellbeing, explore why it matters, examine how our innate sense of play can fade and discuss ways to put nature play back into the centre of children's, and adults’, daily lives. Join us to hear from a distinguished group of experts, including:

Caroline Essame, Founder of Developmental Play and author of Why Play Matters and Why Nature Matters

Emma Spencer, Informal Learning Manager at Yorkshire Sculpture Park

Dr. Sue Stuart-Smith, Psychotherapist, Psychiatrist and author of The Well Gardened Mind

Johanna Tagada Hoffbeck, Artist and Founder of The Gardening Drawing Club

Penny Wilson, Playworker at Assemble Play and author of Play Works

Mia Witham, Swedish Landscape and Garden Designer

Adam White and Andree Davies from Davies White Landscape Architects

With more names to be announced. Your ticket includes refreshments, a delicious vegetarian lunch and an experiential activity. Attendees will also have the opportunity to explore The Plant Library of over 1500 perennials and bulbs, hear from Millie Souter our Head Gardener, and visit Tom and Sue Stuart-Smith’s private Barn Garden. Tickets are limited, so book soon to avoid disappointment.

The Safe Green Space: Nature and Play, a one-day symposium

Join us in the Apple House for an evening of conversation about Knepp - the trailblazing, 3,500-acre rewilding project that has changed the way we think about nature and how we can heal our planet.

Tom Stuart-Smith, who masterminded the ecologically and structurally complex rewilding of the Knepp Walled Garden will be joined in conversation by plantsman, Head Gardener at the Knepp Castle Estate and former TSS Studio landscape designer Charlie Harpur and Matthew Pottage, former curator at RHS Garden Wisley and the new Head of Horticulture and Landscape Strategy for The Royal Parks, as they explore the spaces where rewilding, gardens, landscapes and horticulture meet.

Since the project began rewilding Knepp’s intensively farmed estate in West Sussex just twenty years ago, endangered species such as nightingales, turtle doves and purple emperor butterflies have found sanctuary there. Herds of old English longhorn cattle, Tamworth pigs, Exmoor ponies and red and fallow deer wander the landscape, their disturbance shaping the water meadows, shrubland and wood pasture, creating new habitats for wildlife. The sheer abundance of life is mind-blowing.

Inspired by what they had learned from the wider rewilding project at Knepp, in 2021, Tom collaborated with Charlie Burrel and Issy Tree, the owners and working with James Hitchmough rewilded Knepp’s 1.3 acre Victorian Walled Garden bringing the worlds of rewilding and horticulture together. The design and management of Knepp’s Rewilded Walled Garden rely on a shift in mindset, seeing the unique context of the garden as a functioning ecosystem; a mosaic of habitats that is constantly on the move.

Under Charlie Harpur’s guidance, in the Rewilded Walled Garden the gardeners effectively become the keystone species. Like the herbivores in the wider project, the gardeners disturb the landscape in order to keep it dynamic and complex, to some extent mimicking the actions of animals.

On visiting Knepp's Rewilded Walled Garden in 2024, Matthew Pottage had underestimated the impact it would have on him. As he loves creating microclimates to enable plants to flourish, he was greatly interested in the topography of the site and the growing medium and was struck by the exciting variety of plants. 

In his new role at The Royal Parks, Matt is overseeing the creation of a new garden in Regents Park on a brownfield site, retaining all the building foundations and using a lot of crushed concrete. The next phases of the garden's development will be enlightened by Knepp’s creation of a beautiful garden on a low nutrient, high alkaline substrate.

Knepp: Rewilding Gardens, Landscapes and Horticulture with Charlie Harpur, Matthew Pottage and Tom Stuart-Smith

Visit 3 Gardens: The Plant Library, The Barn Garden and Serge Hill (1 July 2025)

'Why do I like bogs so much? I think it is because I feel very at home with them, I think this has something to do with my queerness and their queer nature as a space.’ - Alys Fowler 

The value of peat bogs as a natural resource and haven of biodiversity is undisputed, yet few of us have been lucky enough to experience their beauty and richness.

Sink deep into the dark, black earths of these rugged places and take a close look at the birds, animals, plants and insects that live within them, with award-winning journalist, author, gardener and presenter Alys Fowler as she launches her compelling new book Peatlands.

Blending memoir with environmental insight, she charts her experiences across places like the Border Mire and the Flow Country, uncovering the rich biodiversity and singular character of these wild spaces.

This is a book about connection—to land, to history, and to the delicate balance of nature. As peat continues to be harvested for horticultural use, Fowler urges us to reconsider what we’re sacrificing—and what it truly means to care for such rare, irreplaceable places.

Alys will reflect on the nature of peat, its cultural and environmental significance and the urgent need to change how we value and care for it.

Hosted in The Apple House eco-barn, in an old orchard,  guests can explore Tom Stuart-Smith’s Plant Library of over 1500 herbaceous perennials and bulbs ahead of the talk and enjoy a drink (included in the ticket price) while they do so.

Alys Fowler on Peatlands: A Journey Between Land and Water

Join us for an inspirational evening in The Apple House with Charles Dowding, the leading proponent of no dig gardening, as he shares his advice from more than 40 years of vegetable growing and no dig experiments, to allow everyone to grow more food for less effort.

He will also introduce key insights from his new book Compost: Transform Waste Into New Life, exploring how to reduce waste, nourish your soil, and enhance your plants with homemade compost.

Since starting his vegetable-growing journey in 1981, Charles has gardened in four different locations and grown hundreds of thousands of crops. His decades of experience have led to the development of the highly effective no dig system, which focuses on supporting the web of organisms in the soil to promote healthy, weed-free crops.

In this session, Charles will offer practical tips and advice on all aspects of no dig vegetable growing, with a focus on compost including:

How to achieve the ideal balance of compost materials

A seasonal timeline for successful composting

Debunking common composting myths, such as:
How to add weeds to your compost
Why heat in your compost bin is not essential
Why worms are not vital to the composting process
Why no dig gardening doesn’t require more compost than traditional methods

Whether you're a seasoned gardener or just starting out, this evening will provide invaluable insights to help you grow vegetables and transform your compost with ease and efficiency.

Charles Dowding on Everything You Need To Know About Compost, No Dig and Growing Vegetables

Learn The Art of Flower Pressing with Amy Fielding and Melissa Richardson, co-founders of London based flower pressing studio JamJar Edit, in this day-long workshop at the Serge Hill Project. 

Taking inspiration from the abundant variety of species growing in our Plant Library of over 1500 perennials and bulbs and surrounding wild flower meadows, you will spend the day immersed in the art of flower pressing. You will leave with the confidence to select, prepare and press suitable flowers for pressing, and equipped with the skills required to make your own exquisite pressed flower artworks.

With practical demonstrations and hands-on guidance, you will learn how to select and prepare flowers for pressing, paying close attention to the shape and structure of the plant specimens, including tips on what to look out for, and the types of flowers that will not press well. 

JamJar will delve deeply into the process of flower pressing, teaching you how to get the best out of your flower press, and tackling some of the more difficult species to press, highlighting the do’s and don’ts and sharing their experience of successes and failures over the years. The workshop includes a flower press which is yours to fill with locally grown seasonal flowers, and take home at the end of the day.

The Art of Flower Pressing Workshop with Amy Fielding and Melissa Richardson of JamJar Edit

The Plant Library and The Barn Garden Visit (15 July 2025)

The Serge Hill Gardens are delighted to host The Plant Fairs Roadshow for the first time in 2025.

As well as independent nurseries of The Plant Fairs Roadshow, The Serge Hill Plant Fair will open up and bring together three iconic, large country gardens a short walk from each other: Tom and Sue Stuart-Smith's The Barn Garden, The Plant Library - a living catalogue of 1500 perennials  planted in sand and green-waste with a new eco-barn, The Apple House - and Kate Stuart-Smith's gardens at Serge Hill, which includes a stunning walled garden.


The plant fair will take place in the field in front of Serge Hill, with refreshments being served across the road in The Apple House. Profits from the entrance fee to the Plant Fair will go to The Serge Hill Project for Gardening, Creativity and Health, a new community interest company founded by Tom & Sue Stuart-Smith, based on the understanding that working with nature can radically transform people’s health and wellbeing.

Attendance is strictly by pre-booked tickets only - book online now.

The Serge Hill Plant Fair 

The Plant Library and The Barn Garden Visit (5 August 2025)

The Plant Library and The Barn Garden Visit (2 September 2025)

In the second of our series of practical propagation workshops, join plantswoman and propagation expert Hannah Fox formerly of Marchants Hardy Plants independent nursery, now running her own micro nursery Bright Green Fox, alongside the Plant Library Head Gardener Millie Souter to learn everything you need to know about seed collection and sowing, division, softwood and semi-ripe cuttings across a wide range of plant types.


Learn the practices and principles of how to best select, collect, sort and store seed as well as how new plants grow from softwood and semi-ripe cuttings, when and how to take them, as well as compost, timing and aftercare. Then, practice the techniques using plants from The Plant Library of over 1500 perennials and bulbs, to collect seeds and take cuttings with you to grow on at home.

Each workshop includes refreshments, materials and handouts and can be booked individually, or together as a course.

Propagation Workshop Series: Late Summer Propagation with Hannah Fox (Bright Green Fox Nursery)

‘Bird School is a feast for mind and soul, a treasure trove of insights into the enigmatic and enchanting world of the birds we share our lives with but barely notice. I have learnt so much. Every page is a thrill. Bird School has opened my eyes.’ Isabella Tree, author of Wilding

Step into the hide for the evening in The Apple House, with bestselling and award-winning nature writer Adam Nicolson and bestselling author and esteemed horticulturist Sarah Raven for a glorious encounter with the wild to mark the publication of Adam’s brilliant new book: Bird School.

Over the last two or three years Adam and Sarah have embarked on getting to know the birds they have found around them at Perch Hill, their home in Sussex, engaging with a layer of life they had previously almost taken for granted.

Close to Perch Hill, there is a forgotten field overrun by bracken and thicketed by brambles. It is the haunt of deer and many birds – nightingales, the occasional cuckoo, ravens, robins, owls and in summer the sweet-singing warblers that come north from Africa to breed in English woods.

Adam Nicolson wanted to look and listen, to return to ‘bird school’ and see what it might teach him. He built a small shed amongst the trees with nesting boxes and bird feeders. Cocooned inside, season after season, he got to know the birds: where they nest, how they sing, how they mate and fight, what preys on them, what they are like as living things.

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