Garden designer crosses the Atlantic to win award

A UK landscape gardener was drafted 5,000 miles to a garden in the Rocky Mountains, USA to combat the effects of a marauding moose – and won a top award into the bargain.

John Wyer was invited to the 10-acre garden by friends desperately in need of garden design.  Their plot in the foothills of the Rockies suffered from sub-zero temperatures in winter, searing heat in summer and very rough, dry land.

With no greenhouse solution on hand John had to be creative.  He designed a garden by planting aspen trees for protection, drought-tolerant grasses and herbaceous plants and creating a path of stone bordered by granite boulders.  John described the project as one the most challenging he had ever tackled, particularly as the first trees were eaten by a moose and there was little soil amongst the granite stone.

John, whose company Bowles & Wyer is based near Leighton Buzzard, received the Society of Garden Designers ‘best international garden’ award for his skill at adapting a design to such a different environment to his usual UK practice.

See the report at http://www.bucksherald.co.uk/news/local-news/marauding-moose-is-no-match-for-vale-s-top-garden-designer-1-4614174

Author: Robert Smith