Gardening for the kitchen...

I know I said that my next article would be on creating a kitchen garden, but the weather has been so lousy that I couldnt think about taking some photos about progress to date, and I have been very busy with other stuff in the meantime. Including a visit this afternoon to Dublin's Bloom Festival (not to be confused with Bloom's Day in June celebrating James Joyce!). The Bloom Festival is Ireland's answer to the Chelsea Flower Show, and is in its second year. Last year, I attended on the only sunny day - this year it looks like the weather will hold up to be fine (in direct contrast to the rain and wind we've had all week).

The Festival has been extended this year to cover a bigger area and the gardens have expanded to match. There were some great examples of both ornamental and vegetable/herb gardens from which to take inspiration - along with some newcomers (to me anyway!) from both arts and crafts and artisan food suppliers. The range of garden plants that could be purchased also seemed to be more adventurous than last year, and I ended up buying a lovely fern for my pergola - I am assured that the plant I bought (a dryopteris) will do wonderfully under the shade. There were lots of gardens where herbs and/or vegetables were the main theme, and also gardens where herbs in particular were sneaking in all over the place in amongst the other planting. Definitely, edible planting is a major fashion right now - hopefully it'll take root for the future (sorry for the pun...). Obviously my own inclinations towards this style of planting isnt an isolated whim, but rather part of a societal shift - interesting that in the UK, the sales of vegetable seeds has outstripped ornamental flower seeds for the first time since World War II - even if this is partly due to the availability of flowering plants even in small corner shops. When we see vegetables and herbs being sold like the ubiquitous marigold or trailing lobelia, then we'll know that growing your own veg isnt just a whim...