Have you been thinking about joining the Guild but not sure if you can/which membership is right for you? Then worry not, we've outlined the different memberships on offer....from full membership to Friend of the Guild. There is something for everyone and anyone with a love of horticulture and gardening. To find out more, or to discuss your membership needs please visit
#gardenmediaguild #GMGmembership #jointheguild #horticulture
There are many reasons why our members join the Garden Media Guild, but here's a little taster of what membership can provide.
If you are thinking about joining the Guild then please do not hesitate to get in touch to find out more -
We've recently seen an influx of new followers so today we wanted to formally introduce ourselves!
We are the Garden Media Guild.
We are an association that brings together professional garden writers, authors, photographers, broadcasters, editors, lecturers and allied trades.
The Garden Media Guild welcomes and supports anyone involved in the horticultural media regardless of their race, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, disability, background or age.
We are committed to listening to, and working with, our members and our colleagues throughout the industry, to ensure that everyone gets an equal opportunity to pursue a career in the gardening media and to advance and prosper in their chosen field.
OUR OBJECTIVES
Raise the quality of garden writing, photography and broadcasting.
Improve communication between members.
Help members operate efficiently and profitably.
Improve liaisons between garden writers, photographers, publishers and more.
To find out more please visit
#gardenmediaguild #gardenwriters #gardenbloggers #gardenvloggers #gardenPR #gardenTV #gardenradio #gardenphotography #welovegardening #horticulture
I can’t understate enough how wonderful it was to be led on a garden tour by Mick Brown at Chatsworth House yesterday 💚
Mick leads the team responsible for the most hardworking three acres of the estate; he is the estate’s highly respected Production Garden Manager and an absolute font of enthusiastic knowledge of this exceptional garden.
@chatsworthofficial is on my back doorstep and I’ve been dozens and dozens of times, so being led into the part of the glasshouse that houses the world-famous Musa cavendish original stock plant was a real treat.
Every single Cavendish banana eaten in the Western world today is a direct clone of this plant you see here. Joseph Paxton, acquired a specimen from Mauritius In 1829, and he finally managed to get it to flower in 1835.
In the late 1830s, the Duke gifted several of these Chatsworth-grown plants to missionaries traveling to the South Pacific and Samoa. From those specific roots, the Cavendish banana was distributed globally, eventually replacing the disease-stricken ‘Gros Michel’ banana in the 1950s to become the global supermarket standard.
It was given its own rescue plan when the Great Stove was demolished in the First World War to protect its lineage, whilst thousands of other plants collected by Paxton had to be sacrificed. So it was wonderful to stand directly amongst the suckers of such an important horticultural achievement.
The other great jewel in this locked glasshouse was another Paxton heritage moment. The team have successfully germinated one of their Victoria amazonica seeds, so this tiny, fairly underwhelming looking plant will be far more impressive by the end of the summer. Paxton won the race against Kew to grow this plant to a bloom from a seedling acquired from Kew. In November 1849 it burst into flower - enabling seed production - and enabling him to claim a victory in the race.
Now, with no more wild seed hunting, all UK giant lily pads are germinated from saved seeds in a seed exchange with each other, so the borrowing and donating continues.
Thank you to @tayloremmetsolicitors for inviting me to join your table at the @derbyshirecharityclayshoot fundraiser yesterday.
Hello & Happy Sunday!
Here's an excerpt from our resident writer, Andrew Jackson's, latest blog. This lovely and insightful piece takes us on a flight around the garden from the perspective of a bee!
'From this higher point, the garden and the town are not separate. The wall does not divide; it translates. On one side, the signals are dense, layered with intention and repetition. On the other, they are more diffuse, more erratic, but no less real. I move between them without preference. Both offer what I need, though in different forms.'
Head over to the blog section on our website to read the full blog (link in bio).
Enjoy!
🐝🐝🐝
Follow Andrew @thenewbuildmanifesto
📷Colin Dicock
It’s Time for our next Mystery Gardening Object of the month. This time it is more of a gardening bygone as you don’t see these that often anymore. You might however see its modern day replacement which looks vastly different.
This is the top part of the bygone as it would sit upon a stone or wooden base in a secluded part of a garden or occasionally they would have a specially made recess in a lovely old stone wall to sit in.
So that’s all the clues I’m giving you, comment below if you want to have a go at guessing what this months Mystery Gardening Object. @thegardenstrust and I are bringing you this 2026 series of mystery garden object of the month and we’d love to hear if you have a favourite old tool pasted down to you.
#horticulture #heritage #gardenstrust
Birmingham! We’re so lucky to have two absolutely incredible public gardens right in the town centre. I was like a giddy groupie this week joining a @gdnmediaguild trip around @winterbournehg and @bhambotanicalgardens so people from outside the city could see the spaces I am so obsessed with.
Thankyou so much to @fumikomiyachi for the brilliant tour of Winterbourne. Such a fascinating and charming place and one very dear to my heart as it was where I did my RHS training a few years ago.
Nice minutes down the road it was such a treat to meet head gardener @the_gardener_b for a tour of Birmingham Botanical Gardens. The site is going to go through some enormous changes in the next few years, with every single plant in the glasshouses being rehoused ready for a £19.4 million renovation of the garden entrance and glasshouses. Some of their specimens are the only ones in the world so it will be a very delicate operation! I am so excited to see this project happen. And I also learned that the stunning rock garden, home to the magnolia collection I love so much, was made thanks to a donation from the Nettlefold family, who originally created Winterbourne.
If you’re anywhere near Birmingham in the coming months - and with @bbcgwlive coming up I know many people will be - do take a trip into town to visit these two absolute gems.
Thankyou so much @gdnmediaguild for organising this tour, and to the teams at @bhambotanicalgardens and @winterbournehg for being so generous with your time.
Last week we had the opportunity thanks to @democracyagency & @gardena_uk to feature @northernlilyuk work and the impact we make by teaching our community how to grow food and producing over 1 tonne every year on a 1 acre site to local food security on @itv 📺
Last year we won the @gardena_uk@national_allotment_society Top Of The Plots Award for Best Community Plot 🏆
#communitygarden #horticulture #growyourown #communitygardening
PLAN YOUR GARDEN
Like any new project, it is really important to plan your garden and the planting scheme you want to introduce within it. If you want some ideas, hints and tips on how to go about doing that have a read of my article Your Garden Design Checklist in the recent Amateur Gardening Magazine.
A massive shout out to Rocketgro for sponsoring the article. If you have not tried their products what are you waiting for. Their compost is brilliant. I use it. They have a reader offer of free plant feed with every order worth £7.99
My weed water 🌱
Cleavers seem to have colonised every part of my allotment and back garden, so am pulling the stuff out by the handful.
However, I have also discovered it’s great for supporting lymphatic drainage if steeped in cold water overnight. As a woman of a certain age, lymphatic drainage suddenly becomes yet another thing to fret about as part of the ageing process, so here I am, drinking weed water.
Eyeing it up as a crop has changed my attitude towards it though, and it helps that it doesn’t taste disgusting.
A quarter of a lime, a slice or two of cucumber and a few freshly picked mint leaves makes this into a more-than-acceptable refreshing cold drink.
#wildfoods #countrycup #herbalremedies #weedsasmedicine
Ask Me Anything | Ciar Byrne
Wednesday 27th May | 6.30pm | Zoom
Join us for our next Ask Me Anything session with journalist, editor and author Ciar Byrne.
With more than 25 years’ experience across The Independent, The Guardian and Private Eye, Ciar now writes a weekly gardening column for the Daily Mail, contributes to Gardens Illustrated and recently became launch editor of Homegrown Kitchen, a brand-new monthly magazine from Key Publishing.
She’s also a published novelist and one of our very own GMG committee members.
During the session, Ciar will discuss her career across national journalism and garden media, what goes into launching a new magazine, and balancing editorial life with fiction writing.
Questions from members are very welcome.
Register now at
