‘Stunning’ peat-free RHS garden donated to charity

A group of gardeners with learning disabilities are "over the moon" to receive a designer "peat-free" garden from the Royal Horticultural Society.

Sunnyside Rural Trust in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, will keep the display after its residency at the RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival.

It was created by TV presenter and garden designer Arit Anderson, who grew up in Hertfordshire.

She said she was "overjoyed" and "couldn’t think of more worthy guardians than the incredible team at Sunnyside."

The charity and social enterprise offers training and work experience to more than 170 vulnerable people at its sites in Berkhamsted, Hemel, and Northchurch, including skills in landscaping, beekeeping and horticulture.

Their work provides a “green oasis for public”, said Sunnyside’s CEO Keely Siddiqui-Charlick.

"It flips that sense of people needing care, as actually they’re offering something really wonderful and therapeutic to everyone.

"We feel really strongly that people need to be engaged in meaningful activity and work out what they’re good at and capable of, rather than focussing on what people have been told majority of life they can't do."

Ms Siddiqui-Charlick said the team were "over the moon, really proud" to supply plants to the RHS feature garden.

"It’s stunning. There is a huge range of very unusual foxgloves, some stock plants, a shady bed and a summery bed – lots of unusual colour combinations."

All the plants and trees were grown using peat-free compost, to highlight a more environmentally friendly approach.

Sunnyside supplies thousands of bedding plants to Dacorum Borough Council and went peat-free three years ago.

"We'd been going on our merry way, using tonnes of bags of compost, before we learned about the problems with peat," said Ms Siddiqui-Charlick

She is proud that they are "leading the way" in demonstrating that it’s possible to grow at scale with peat-free compost.

Arit Anderson said: "I’m overjoyed that the RHS Peat-Free Garden will live on at Sunnyside Rural Trust.

"Their community work is inspirational, and the fact that, as a small organisation, they run a 100% peat-free commercial nursery just goes to show that this transition is fully achievable for businesses of all sizes."

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