Open Gardens - Series 1 - Episode 4

Carol Klein presents a series which follows 20 gardeners as they attempt to have their gardens accepted into the National Gardens Scheme. Mike's place, Courtwood House, is a small garden with a traditional Staffordshire wall enclosing all its dense foliage. Mike thinks of his garden as a living art installation – features include his wood-carvings and sculptures of reclaimed scrap materials. Mike is worried that his garden will be too small to provide the required level of interest, so if he does get accepted he plans to paint some large canvases to place among the plants. Whilst he has a problem with his lawn and is ripping it up and laying brand new turf, Janet at Little Winsors is turning an acre of field into a large, wild garden high on a Devonshire hillside, and it needs a lot of planting. Janet is creating her garden from her late husbands plan. Before he died five years ago, Janet’s husband Gerald had dreamed of creating a large garden from scratch and had drawn a detailed plant plan. But she has a large bog garden that is still under black plastic and needs a lot of planting. Will this be too much of a scar on the garden for her to open it to the public?