OCTOBER SOCIAL EVENING
Tuesday 28th October
Steve Bustin
Guns, Ghosts and Guerilla Gardening: The Life and Times of Ellen Willmott
Steve Bustin is a keen gardener based in Brighton, a garden writer (for titles including Amateur Gardening, Beautiful Gardens and US magazine Pith & Vigor), and a speaker on a range of garden history topics.
‘Guns, Ghosts and Guerrilla Gardening: The Life and Times of Ellen Willmott, the greatest Edwardian gardener you've never heard of’.
Ellen Willmott was celebrated as one of the greatest gardeners of her age, bred roses, daffodils and hundreds of other plants and her garden in Essex was visited by royalty.
She was one of the first women to receive the RHS Victoria Medal of Honour and was a judge at Chelsea. She was also eccentric, cantankerous and lived for the moment - she inherited a fortune and spent the lot, largely buying gardens, plants and musical instruments.
She’s probably best known now through the common name for Eryngium Giganteum - Giant Sea Holly ‘Miss Willmott’s Ghost’.
*** Fun Competition*** An Autumn Bouquet in own vase
