Multi-award winning garden designer Chris Beardshaw will be divulging the secrets of planting with an artist’s eye at GROW this June in his talk, Painting with Plants.

If you can’t wait until then to hear from him, enjoy this quick interview in which he reveals the secrets of his own garden.

Describe your garden/gardening style
A blend of formal structure overlaid with informal planting. All my schemes give plants the main focus and spotlight.

Which tool couldn’t you be without?
My Tina knife which I’ve owned for longer than I care to think about, it goes everywhere with me.

Which garden has had the greatest impact on you?
Hidcote Manor Garden in the Cotswolds, I visited as a boy and have returned many times over the years.

Most unusual thing you’ve found in your garden?
We found a horse shoe and as it’s supposed to be lucky, we hung it up over our door.

Your lucky break?
I think it’s all about being in the right place at the right time.

Greatest gardening disaster?
Not having enough time to tend to my own garden!

Favourite London garden/outside space?
Currently Greenwich Park – I’ve been visiting a lot over the last year whilst designing a herbaceous border for the royal park. It’s given me the opportunity to visit and appreciate a park I didn’t know very well and the views of London are simply stunning.

When you’re in your garden, what do you spend most of your time doing?
Tidying away things my children have left out!

Life motto?
Don’t be afraid to tread your own path.

You can catch Chris’s talk at GROW London on Friday 20 June at 1.30pm. For more details, our full programme is listed on our Talks page.