Award-winning garden gets new home at university

An award-winning garden, originally showcased at RHS Flower Show Tatton Park 2023, has found a new home at a university

"Chained to Tech" which was created by award-winning designer Rachel Platt and commissioned by bulbs and plants specialists J. Parker’s, will be on permanent view at Manchester Metropolitan University.

The RHS said it "highlights some of the physical and mental effects of screen-based technologies".

Ms Platt said it was "an incredible honour" for her design to "become an accessible space within a great university".

She added: "Having been to university myself, I hope that the technological inspired, contemporary garden, with its fun and vibrant planting, will offer students a rejuvenating escape away from their studies, ultimately enhancing their well-being and academic performance."

Lucy Walker, a psychology lecturer at MMU, who has been working on the project, said: “Spending time in nature has a huge impact on both our wellbeing and productivity at work."

She added the garden at the university's Brooks Building "gives us an exciting opportunity to investigate this further, making use of a dynamic green space on our doorstep in order to demonstrate the beneficial effects in staff, students, and visitors".

MMU said the garden's unique design was inspired by the digital world with rebar arbours and fences mimicking cables, and laser-cut panels replicating circuit board patterns.

To create a textured, industrial feel, recycled timber and Corten effect steel is used throughout and drought-tolerant plants symbolise "the strain of excessive screen time, while bold colours and shapes evoke the instant gratification of technology".

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