Hi, Sweetpea,

 Hi, Mummy Bear

 We have a chit chat coming, it is episode 74.

 It is.

 Now, you may know him from Homefront, Top of the Pops,

 Come Dine with Me, Only Fools on Horses,

 Strictly Come Dancing, Gardening Together,

 Greatest Gardens, the list is endless.

 It is.

 But not just that, also you will know him

 from his incredible and elaborate

 and fantastical show gardens at Chelsea.

 Yes.

 It is indeed the one, the only Diarmuid Gavin.

 Diarmuid Gavin.

 Oh, yes, people.

 So we do need to set the scene.

 Yes.

 Diarmuid is in his kitchen and he’s on an iPad

 that wouldn’t rotate the image.

 So we were on our sides.

 Yeah, he was looking at us at a 90 degree angle

 throughout this chat.

 Yeah.

 But it also meant that when he was trying

 to point to things in the background on his screen,

 it was all kind of a bit of a mishmash

 because everything was at the wrong angle.

 So he was struggling to point out

 where a Dicksonia was and where the gap was in his kitchen.

 So you’ll hear that a bit.

 It is at the time when he’s talking about

 the work he’s had done on his kitchen.

 So just so that you can picture

 what grief poor Diarmuid was dealing with at that point.

 It was grief.

 He went through all five stages.

 But this was a fantastic chat, wasn’t it, Sweetpea?

 I would call this podcast, this episode, really juicy.

 There was so much to it.

 You have the stone, the really dense part,

 which is quite hard and quite deep.

 What analogy are we using here?

 You have the fleshy part, which is quite soft

 and sweet and just chill to listen to.

 And then you have the rind,

 which has got a bit of a tanginess.

 Right.

 So yes, that’s the analogy.

 I thought you were going along the lines of a peach

 because you have a stone, but then you have a rind.

 Oh my gosh, what fruit was I going for?

 Well, my overriding feeling from this chat

 was that basically everything Diarmuid does,

 there’s always an injection of fun.

 And he also makes you feel like anything’s possible.

 And I came away feeling very, very inspired.

 Basically, if you have an idea

 or if you want to do something, just do it.

 Don’t worry about failure or what people think.

 Have courage of your convictions, go for it.

 Absolutely.

 But we do have a very interesting and very chat

 as you mentioned your peach slash lemon analogy.

 There’s some very thought-provoking stuff about Chelsea

 and show gardens in general

 and the world of garden design.

 And there’s also some scary stuff about AI

 that really, you know, had a lot of concerns there

 about where we’re going with the world of AI.

 And actually on that, I’m in the midst of reading

 Thirst by John Robbins for anyone who doesn’t know

 who he is, he’s a fantastic comedian.

 He’s one of my favourites, really makes me laugh.

 But he’s also got a very kind of intelligent approach

 to everything, a very deep approach to everything.

 A very deep, yeah.

 Some might say too deep.

 He thinks too much about stuff.

 Too much.

 But his book is amazing.

 And shortly after we’d had this chat with Diarmuid,

 I read a chapter in John’s book and it really resonated.

 And I just wanted to quote to you, Sweetpea, what he says.

 Oh yeah.

 He says, “when technology tells us it makes a process

 quicker, more efficient, or intuitive,

 it is claiming to remove time, effort,

 mistakes, and confusion.

 It might be worth asking, is it always beneficial

 to remove those things from our lives?

 Technology also removes accident, unexpected discovery,

 curiosity, and human connection.

 All things that make life interesting and rewarding.

 Also, as we are currently seeing in every industry,

 it removes the enormous inefficiency of employment

 of human beings themselves.”

 Yeah.

 Do you see how that’s such, so connects

 with our conversation with Diarmuid?

 Oh my gosh.

 But it is that point of, you know,

 the accidents that happen, the chances that,

 so with your university work,

 when you’re, you know, researching something,

 sure, you can go and ask chat GPT

 and it’ll give you all the answers.

 Of course.

 But it’s through you going to the library

 and going through books on the shelves,

 trying to find the information and answers

 that you come across other stuff as well.

 Exactly.

 That’s how your mind is expanding.

 Yeah, and the amount of things

 that get discovered accidentally.

 From researching one thing

 and then they accidentally find another type of atom

 or something like that.

 Penicillin. Penicillin, thank you.

 Loads of things like that.

 It’s really quite incredible.

 Yeah.

 And it’s taken away by technology.

 Yeah, absolutely.

 Anyway, so quite thought provoking, all of that.

 But a couple of things from the chat.

 Firstly, when Diarmuid talks about the bride

 jilted at the altar and great expectations.

 That was Miss Haversham, of course,

 who sat in Cork Lodge.

 So that’s what he was referring to there.

 Also, he references a Chatham Island birch

 for the statement tree.

 None of us could find this tree.

 We could not.

 We researched this thing like crazy,

 could not find it.

 We looked online.

 I just got beeches.

 To the extent that Diarmuid even started

 to question his own sanity over it.

 So if anyone knows what that is.

 It was a psychological thriller at that point.

 It’s a very tall, straight tree.

 Ugly, tall, straight, ugly tree.

 Apparently it’s really quite ugly,

 but he likes it for some reason.

 So if anyone knows what tree that is,

 please do let us know.

 And it’s also important to note, Sweetpea,

 that when you make a comment about what you think

 Monty Don is growing in his greenhouse,

 we must be clear that you don’t know for sure.

 I do not know for sure.

 No, no, this is just a little bit of a thought.

 You were merely suggesting it was a possibility

 and in the interest of balance,

 he also is most likely not growing

 that particular plant in his greenhouse.

 We’re giving just a balanced view about life.

 Let’s just be clear on that.

 Now, as always, you can find links

 and places that Diarmuid’s visited

 and recommendations that he makes on the website.

 So if you go onto our website,

 notjustgarden.co.uk,

 go to the Chit Chats page,

 click on Diarmuid’s face in the Rogues’ Gallery.

 That’ll take you to all of those.

 Then pop over to the gardens page

 and you’ll see on the map all the places

 that he’s visited or recommended.

 So Sweetpea, tell us the format.

 So for Diarmuid’s dream garden,

 we have the garden boundary,

 shed a greenhouse, five ornamentals,

 five edibles, one statement tree,

 pond or pool plus one plant

 and finally, favourite seating area,

 drink and one plant for that area.

 Not necessarily in that order.

 Not necessarily in that order

 because Sweetpea messed up big time on the tree front.

 And if you have any questions or comments

 on anything we’ve chatted about,

 please do get in touch.

 You can do that through the website,

 which is notjustgarden.co.uk.

 Head over to the contacts page there

 or you can email us at notjustgarden@outlook.com

 So shall we have a listen to this Chit Chat Sweetpea?

 Absolutely, let’s get into it.

 This is episode 74,

 A Good Ol’ Chit-Chat with Diarmuid Gavin.

 Off we go.

 Welcome Diarmuid, to A Good Ol’ Chit-Chat.

 Lovely to be here.

 Thank you so much for joining us.

 Usually we have our guests come on.

 They’ve usually had a segment on Gardeners’ World,

 either a guest or a presenter.

 And so obviously your connection to Gardeners’ World

 is from way, way, way back in the past.

 I think I did a fashion item on it once.

 Right.

 And I think that was it.

 And what’s more, I don’t watch gardening programs.

 So I’ve seen Gardeners’ World

 when Geoff Hamilton was on it and that’s going back.

 Way back.

 But I know some of the people involved

 and I was working with Adam recently

 and I’m working with Carol at the moment.

 So I’m in the orbit of that team.

 And the work you’re doing with Carol is Greatest Gardens.

 That’s right.

 Can you explain the format of that?

 Yeah, it’s a six part series.

 We’re on, actually, weirdly we’re on series three

 because we made, not with Carol,

 we made series one 13 years ago

 with an amazing gardener called Helen Dillon.

 And it got picked up again after 12 years,

 this time with Carol Klein.

 So we made the first series last year,

 which was superb.

 The idea behind it is we go around the north of Ireland,

 visit three gardens per episode

 and we’re joined by a celebrity guest

 and we give them marks out of 10

 in categories of planting, sustainability and design.

 And then we have an overall winner.

 Wow.

 Why was there the hiatus of 12 years?

 I think what they realized,

 I think iPlayer came into its own

 and they realized that that program

 and then a subsequent program I made with the same team

 based in my own garden here did very, very well.

 So when they were looking to do something new with me,

 they looked back at that one and we,

 Carol has, sorry, Helen has retired

 from gardening and broadcasting.

 So that’s when Carol joined.

 I see.

 Okay, and that’s on the BBC, isn’t it?

 That’s on BBC, yes.

 It starts off BBC Northern Ireland,

 but it then goes network after the first transmission

 in the north of Ireland.

 Okay, and the series that you were doing

 from your own garden, was that gardening together?

 That’s right.

 So we did that during lockdown

 and that came about through,

 nightly broadcasts myself and another gardener,

 Paul Smyth, great, amazing young gardener,

 they’d over Instagram.

 So we did that for a year and a half

 for pretty much every evening.

 From that, we did a podcast, a book

 and then television series.

 Right, and so that was based in your garden.

 So is there footage online that we’d be able to find

 of your incredible garden there?

 Well, I don’t know if it’s incredible

 and Carol is coming to see it next week.

 So yeah, it’s slightly dreading that,

 but mind you, she’s dreading me going to her,

 so it’ll even out.

 You put on Instagram that you have a mystery visitor.

 Is that who we’re talking about?

 That’s Carol, yes.

 Oh, okay, gosh, you heard it here first.

 So I did see that you were frantically clearing it.

 You were ripping wisterias off your railings

 and what’s just going on.

 Trying to do everything because of course,

 making the programme and we’ve been making it

 since a bit, late May, it means I’m never here

 because we’re based in, we have one location

 and just outside Belfast that we’re based.

 So Carol is never in her garden, I’m never here.

 And now all of a sudden, we have a week

 to get both our gardens ready for the cameras

 and they’re only, we keep fricking

 and the director keeps reminding us

 there’s only three minutes each in each garden,

 so no need to panic.

 They’ll hide all the bad bits.

 Yeah, exactly, close ups.

 Lots of close ups, yeah.

 That’s what you need in our garden, for sure.

 So I, talking of gardening programmes,

 you say you don’t watch many.

 I watch certainly less now than I used to,

 but back in the 90s, I used to watch Home Front,

 was it, with you and Laurence Llewellyn Bowen.

 Yes, yeah.

 To do these incredible garden designs.

 Well, it was every week, wasn’t it?

 It was a weekly series.

 It was a weekly series and actually,

 there were two series.

 So the first one was, there had been a programme

 called Homefront with Kevin MacLeod

 and a Scottish woman called Anne McKevitt.

 And I came in to create an offshoot

 of that Homefront in the garden.

 So that ran for, I think, 10 years.

 And towards the end, we took over,

 myself and Laurence took over the main programme.

 So we had both combined.

 So yeah, 10 or 11 years of making,

 well, the kind of lots and lots.

 Programmes were very successful,

 so BBC wanted more and more.

 So yeah, we made over lots of,

 had lots of fun creating different gardens,

 vibrant, exciting.

 The whole idea of that programme was,

 in the contemporary age,

 to explore what a garden could be

 for the way people lived then.

 And to take inspiration beyond gardening

 or traditional inspiration,

 to look to art and architecture

 and anything else and bring new ideas.

 Yeah, well, cause on the home element

 with Laurence Llewellyn-Bowen,

 he was always particularly wacky, wasn’t he?

 And very contemporary with his…

 He remained true to his style.

 Which was often muck, baroque.

 That’s it, yeah.

 Oh yeah, good time.

 But he was brilliant and he’s a great person

 to work with, great fun and great historian

 in all things, art, design and culture.

 So great fun to be around.

 So you came, the home front came off the back of what?

 Was that off the back of your show gardens at Chelsea?

 Yes, it did.

 But I had a…

 So I created two gardens at the Chelsea Flower Show

 in 1995 and 1996.

 The one in 1996 was my version

 of what a contemporary garden could be at the time.

 And it was inspired by Michael Jackson video

 for Billie Jean when he danced down the side way

 and it illuminated and the men’s loo

 in a Dublin nightclub.

 So quite a combination and it wasn’t a great garden.

 But I know it was terrible.

 And even while I was making it,

 I knew it was terrible and it’s almost impossible

 not to get an award at Chelsea.

 But this didn’t get an award.

 It got a letter saying go away and never come back

 because it was that bad.

 But it looked great on television.

 So one…

 It’s gonna get the media going.

 Yes, because it lit up and because it was different.

 So one night, the BBC recorded Alan Titchmarsh

 came along during the day and I stayed at night

 to show the garden illuminated.

 And I watched this go out on a Wednesday night

 and I thought it was terrible and hateful

 but it was quite exciting being on the BBC.

 But Thursday morning, my life had changed

 because the crowds around the garden

 and by the end of that week,

 I’d had my first television offer.

 So I did, which was wild,

 which was to do a gardening,

 the pilot for a gardening comedy quiz show.

 I’d be the captain of one team.

 Alan Titchmarsh would be the captain of another.

 And the actress from To The Manor Born,

 Penelope Keith, who just passed away,

 was on my team.

 And we recorded that, I think,

 maybe a week after Chelsea in Kew Gardens.

 And within…

 Actually, funny, and then the thing that was happened,

 I was been lined up to take over Gardeners’ World.

 So Geoff Hamilton was presenting Gardeners’ World

 and I can’t remember who the production company was

 but there was a presenter called Gay Search.

 Her husband was Tony Lye

 and they were based in Shepherd’s Bush.

 And I think they’d had,

 they’d been making it for a few years.

 It had come out from the BBC and gone private for a while.

 And I was auditioned to take over,

 to gently ease me in.

 And I think the idea was

 that Geoff would be gently kind of retire.

 So there would be an overlap between the two of you?

 There’d be an overlap maybe of a year,

 which was all weird for me

 because I’d never done television before.

 And then within a month, Geoff passed away.

 And so that was very dramatic.

 And he was hugely, hugely loved,

 especially, I think,

 I had watched his cottage garden series or parts of it

 or I had a VHS copy of it and he was great.

 But then Alan came in.

 So instead, with the same team,

 I made the first gardening series for Channel 5,

 which was due to start the following year.

 But yes, twice I’ve due to be the,

 it happened much later on again,

 where the controller also wanted to put me in

 as the lead on Gardener’s World.

 But it wasn’t-

 Right, what happened then?

 I think she got sense.

 I would have been terrible in both cases.

 But then she,

 so she changed and she did a Chelsea series with me instead

 called Diarmuid’s Big Adventure.

 But so I was doing lots of,

 I think I’ve worked for every session,

 even in my first year before I worked,

 before Homefront came along.

 And then Simon Shaw, who was the producer of Homefront,

 rang me up and said,

 ask would I come along?

 And that was maybe the call that I’d been waiting for,

 but it was certainly the call

 that changed everything for me.

 So would you, if the call came again

 to present Gardener’s World,

 would you do it?

 Third time lucky?

 Yeah, I would do it.

 The call won’t come, though,

 because there’s plenty of really good people.

 And I think they have their next line up with Adam

 and what’s the girl?

 Frances, yeah.

 So yes, I’d be inappropriate.

 But working with Carol,

 she was due to lead it at one stage,

 I think when Monty wasn’t well or something.

 So you never know what happens with that programme.

 But they’ve-

 It’s a moving feast.

 I know people love it.

 Yeah, it’s a staple, isn’t it?

 Tell us more about this comedy gardening quiz show.

 Pilot, that sounds incredible.

 We only made the pilot, so it was never commissioned.

 So it was just that one day in Kew Gardens,

 in the Orangery, I think it was, in Kew Gardens.

 Myself, Alan, Penelope, and then there was a comedian.

 So I had Penelope and a comedian called Jeff Green

 on my team.

 I can’t remember who Alan’s guests were,

 but it was just weird to come back from Chelsea

 then to fly over again to go to,

 and to be involved in this thing called television,

 especially in another country,

 and especially with Household Dent.

 And I think I had just, I had recently married

 and my mother-in-law may as well have been Penelope Keith.

 Right.

 So that was scary and delightful.

 Yeah, in equal measures.

 In equal measures.

 And then I worked with Penelope again,

 because we went, I was doing something for ITV

 on this morning, and we went back to the manor,

 from To The Manor Born,

 and we filmed her with herself and her hubby.

 She was wonderful.

 Yeah, she’s as you would imagine.

 Yes, exactly as you’d imagine.

 And that’s a programme that I certainly watched

 and loved to good life, and To The Manor Born.

 So, and with that programme that we were doing,

 that series of small films that we did,

 we went all around the world,

 seeing where movies and sitcoms were made,

 or comedy series, if they featured gardens.

 Oh, right.

 So, you know, we went to Dallas to meet Sue Ellen

 and the place that The Darling Buds of May was shot.

 Amazing.

 Yeah, had the most remarkable time, yeah.

 What was it like seeing some of those places

 not through a screen?

 Well, just wonderful.

 In particular, probably my favourite was

 a sci-fi series, I suppose, called The Prisoner,

 that was made then in Portmeirion,

 to go there, and I’d never been there.

 So, Portmeirion is this remarkable place in,

 or near Anglesey in Wales,

 maybe 40 minutes from Anglesey.

 And it’s an Italian village perched on a kind of

 cliff top overlooking a bay, the most glorious beach.

 And it was created in maybe late 1800s,

 early 1900s by Clough William-Ellis,

 who was an eccentric architect.

 And he based it on Portofino, I think it was, in Italy.

 And it’s the most astonishing place.

 And then in the 70s, this film crew went there

 for ITV for a number of series,

 making a remarkable series that nobody ever understood.

 Even the people who were making it didn’t understand it,

 but secret agents had been sprinted off to this place

 that they couldn’t escape from.

 But Portmeirion turns out to be remarkable,

 with absolutely wonderful gardens.

 So that was one of the exciting things.

 But again, meeting Bobby and Sue Ellen in Dallas

 was right up there.

 Wow. Pretty awesome.

 And actually, when we went to Dallas,

 they were rebooting the series.

 So we were on set.

 So not only were we at the house just outside the city,

 but we were in the studio

 with them interviewing all these people.

 So that was a real treat.

 When was that then?

 I suppose that was six or seven years ago.

 Right. Did they reboot it then?

 They made it for three series.

 And what was remarkable about it was the cast,

 obviously, Larry Hagman had passed,

 but the cast obviously adored each other.

 And there were new people in the cast.

 So the gardener from with Siri Elaine,

 what was that series?

 I remember interviewing him, Jesse Metcalf.

 So he played the young J.R.

 Desperate Housewives?

 That’s right.

 Right.

 Oh, he was the young J.R.?

 He was the young J.R.

 Ah, right.

 Yeah, that makes sense.

 I can see that.

 Well, so your work,

 so from that one garden that even you thought was rubbish.

 Yes.

 Your career just exploded in a whole different direction

 to what you’d anticipated.

 Yes.

 I always wanted to make gardens,

 but I always wanted to make gardens that were different,

 that kind of challenged,

 that weren’t just pretty and that took other inspiration.

 And I found, you know,

 I studied in the Botanic Gardens in Dublin

 and I found I was good at making gardens

 from the Botanic Gardens.

 I had very good plant knowledge.

 I had very good gardening skills

 because it was a three year course

 and half of every day was spent out

 working with the gardeners

 in the various sections of the gardens.

 And I could make very pleasing gardens.

 I just had an aptitude for it.

 I could go to the garden competitions in Ireland

 and win the gold medals and whatever.

 But after a while it didn’t interest me

 because nobody wanted anything

 that was in any way different.

 Things were either deeply suburban

 or very classically inspired

 and said nothing about, for me,

 the contemporary age or where we were now

 or things weren’t allowed to take any influence

 in terms of planting soil or technology

 or materials or just new ideas.

 So after doing that,

 making kind of pretty gardens

 for pretty people around Ireland for 10 years,

 I escaped over to London,

 funnily enough, where I’d been born

 and where we still had big links

 and continued to do to this day.

 So I went over, created a garden at Chelsea,

 decided that maybe if I was coming over first time

 and begging my way in,

 I’d do an Irish garden

 because that’s what would be expected

 from somebody from this country.

 So that’s what we did on no budget

 on arriving in Chelsea with 300 pounds

 when 60,000 pounds was needed.

 That’s mad, isn’t it?

 It was mad. 300 quid.

 And nowhere to live and no money to buy food

 and whatever.

 So that was a real challenge.

 And then to go back the following year,

 and this was the year that I was going to change

 everything with this contemporary garden

 and it wasn’t the garden that changed things.

 But yeah, to have life change overnight was extraordinary

 because after that second year,

 I just didn’t get home for years.

 You know, the occasional visit back.

 But I was making a lot of regional programs.

 I was working for a company called Action Time

 who were based in Manchester.

 Action Time did a lot of quiz shows

 and like most of the quiz shows

 we’d watch on a Saturday night would be made through them.

 And gardening was beginning to get very popular.

 So I joined a show called Surprise Gardeners

 which again, I made for about eight seasons.

 And the premise of that is that we would go

 to a garden centre, hide behind plants

 and I would jump out and surprise people and say,

 my name is Jörg. Surprise.

 How would you like if I came home

 and did your garden for free in one day?

 And we traveled all around the region doing that.

 So many, so many gardens.

 And we’d go from garden to garden

 as a kind of traveling circus with a rather big crew.

 And then we’d say, we’d drink in the bar until 2 a.m.

 And at seven we’d be on site at it again.

 But years doing that and it was great.

 And then I was doing other programs.

 I was doing a program called Collectors Lot for Channel 4

 which had nothing to do with gardening.

 Going around seeing people’s collections of milk bottles.

 Right. Oh crikey.

 And other stuff.

 And then I started making travel programs back in Ireland.

 So lots happened before the Homefront

 but once Homefront started for me,

 it certainly became my home.

 And did you enjoy that whirlwind at the time?

 Was it exhausting?

 I was confused by it because I was 30.

 Nobody had ever asked me to do anything in my life.

 It was always me begging, can I have a go at this

 or do that or,

 cause I tried to do a different garden.

 And then for that to totally changed

 and I’d never earned any money either.

 So all of a sudden to be earning something.

 And then also I’d never been regarded

 as clever in school.

 And to be told you’re good at this thing called television.

 That really confused me

 because nobody had been complimentary

 about anything I had done.

 And I’d failed every exam.

 And then to be told, right, you can do this

 and the camera likes you

 and you’re trying to analyze that.

 So it was very confusing.

 And kind of all these programs

 were slow burners in a way.

 So nobody knew what I was doing, which was great.

 So it took about three years

 before things really started to be noticed by people.

 But that gave me three years to get used to this new idea

 and what life in the public would be then

 like subsequently.

 A lot of people who have that experience

 often go quite off the rails

 and sort of head down quite a self-destructive route

 at times.

 Did it impact you like that

 or did you have a good support system around you

 that kept you feeling around?

 It didn’t impact like that

 because I’ve always been very strong about my work.

 And when I’m working, I’m working.

 And then when I’m partying, I’m partying.

 But I didn’t tend to,

 when we started doing the big programs,

 marry the two.

 Television industry is a very social industry

 and maybe more so back then.

 I mean, incredibly so.

 But I was just doing a different program every day.

 So I was traveling every day.

 I kind of for long periods of time had not fixed a board.

 I used it through the keyhole with David Frost.

 And I think I used to have in Leeds

 and then I’d be doing another show on another city.

 And I’d just get these reams of paper facts through

 and have to make a train somewhere.

 And I’d be carrying suitcases of clothes

 because I really lived nowhere for a long time.

 So there wasn’t time,

 there wasn’t the opportunity to go off the rails.

 Then when I started doing Homefront,

 all my colleagues who I used to work with in Dublin

 came over to be project managers

 and to build out the teams.

 But even then we were doing

 two or four gardens at a time.

 And these were all big builds.

 Every one of them would be at least two weeks

 on the Homefront with Laurence,

 they’d be three or four week builds.

 So I would be either getting on a train

 or then driving throughout the country,

 arriving in a different town,

 maybe at 11 p.m. to plant a garden

 before the reveal the following day.

 So there was no time.

 And then later when it became very rock and roll,

 then it really got fun.

 And I wouldn’t say I went off the rails,

 but whether it was drinking champagne

 in 10 Downing Street or in the gardens of Buckingham Palace

 or St. James’s Palace

 and bringing your art to Hootenanny with Jules Holland,

 there were so many fun times.

 Yeah, and enjoy it, sit back and relax a bit more.

 Oh, it was brilliant, yeah.

 And then everybody came over from Ireland

 and then, yeah, you’d have book launches,

 because I think I did about 10 books during that period.

 So you’d have book launches

 in the most extraordinary places

 and then you’d be invited to the most amazing places.

 So they were all party times,

 but not generally when the work was going on.

 It sounds an incredibly fun time.

 I understand it’s exhausting,

 but at that age as well,

 when you are able to do that,

 you don’t have dependents, for example,

 just to be able to strike while the iron’s hot.

 That’s what it was.

 That’s what it was.

 It was fun times.

 We were, so eventually I got myself a studio

 in Portobello Road,

 so that was in the heart of everything.

 Brian Eno had a studio from Roxy Music.

 Oh yeah.

 Had a studio downstairs.

 Our space used to be,

 I think it was Zandra Road’s or somebody like that.

 So we were in the middle of a very creative environment.

 Proper rock and roll.

 Yeah, proper rock and roll.

 All the rock and rollers loved us

 because our gardens were different.

 So I went to all these recordings of other shows.

 I remember rearranging the Blue Peter Garden

 with Primal Scream at three in the morning.

 That was proper rock and roll.

 And the bodyguard.

 And the bodyguard,

 or the security guard who threw us out.

 Yeah, that was all mad.

 And there was loads of that type of stuff.

 I remember one particular book,

 I think I was going in to see Joel Wiley on the radio

 and I had, every year I’d get a new,

 from Jaguar, they’d give me a new XKR convertible.

 Now I knew nothing about cars,

 but this was an amazing sports car

 that I’d keep my shovels in the back seat.

 And I remember abandoning that in the middle of,

 somewhere in London,

 because I was late for this interview,

 grabbing a bottle of champagne and going in to Joel Wiley.

 And she said, in all the years,

 no rocker had ever brought her champagne.

 So yeah, there was lots of fun times like that.

 Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

 It sounds fantastic times.

 It was, it was fantastic.

 And you could go everywhere.

 There was invites to everything that was happening.

 There were parties every other week.

 It was brilliant.

 Yeah.

 You mentioned earlier about how you were hoping

 that your contemporary garden would shape things up a bit

 with these garden shows.

 Chelsea, for example,

 have you managed to achieve that

 with any of your show gardens?

 To shape things up?

 Yeah, I think it did.

 I think then what happened after that second year,

 the following year, Channel 4 had the coverage.

 So myself and Monte Don were presenters for Chelsea.

 Maybe we did it one year, maybe we did it a few years.

 Can’t remember what it was.

 And then I took over presenting with Alan

 on the Chelsea program.

 And I was passing judgment on people’s gardens

 and I didn’t enjoy that.

 I enjoyed the whole fun of live broadcasting.

 Alan in particular was very kind training me with that.

 But I didn’t enjoy not doing gardenists

 because I felt I was, rather than be up in a commentary box

 and presenting and interviewing people,

 I should be down there making gardens.

 So I went back to make gardens at Chelsea.

 I can’t remember what year, in 2004.

 I can’t remember because the BBC made a big series

 about it called Diarmuidt’s Big Adventure

 following the making of the Lollipop Garden.

 And from then on, I started doing gardens

 that were different and that were challenging.

 So gardens that were multi-storeyed

 or one particular garden that flew or raised up

 had a pavilion that rose above the crowds.

 And then we-

 And machinery and all sorts.

 Yes, and we did another garden

 that was quite Edwardian in style, but it moved.

 It put on a kind of Heath Robinson performance

 with about seven different actions.

 So plants would bob up and down,

 top re-trees would twirl around

 and the folly would move

 and there were turntables,

 so whole arrangements of plants.

 A sundial would turn over, very Wallace and Gromit.

 So yeah, I think, you see,

 the thing of it, I’d won all the medals

 and I’d won them very easily at the Dublin shows.

 So I didn’t care.

 I saw what you had to do for medals.

 Just please the judges or please the establishment.

 I had no interest in that.

 I had plenty of work because I was on telly.

 So whether the work was garden design work,

 doing other programs, doing promotions or stuff like that,

 I didn’t need to earn my money

 through getting a gold medal at Chelsea.

 So I had freedom to be different.

 I didn’t like the gardens that were being produced

 at Chelsea, still don’t.

 And I wanted to challenge

 and I think that gardening

 is one of the most creative of all crafts.

 And I didn’t understand why it couldn’t move on.

 Not for everybody.

 Most people like my wife or my daughter

 wouldn’t want one of my kind of Chelsea style gardens

 or one of the gardens that maybe I did on television.

 They want something very different.

 Then we have something very different at home

 because they’re the clients in a way.

 But I felt Chelsea was amazing.

 The RHS had built this incredible forum

 where they’d invite people, television cameras

 and the world’s press to your garden.

 So here was this amazing opportunity

 to try something different and not always succeed

 but just tell a different story.

 So once I gave myself the freedom

 of not wanting their medals,

 not appearing on medals day when the medals were

 given out, so not being affected by it so much.

 That gave me a freedom to try and do things differently.

 So I think what it did early on,

 I think probably what influenced Chelsea

 more than the gardens I did with Chelsea

 were looking back on the home front gardens.

 Because when I went into Chelsea,

 they were still doing very sweet

 but very traditional rock gardens

 on the rock garden bank.

 And there were lots of themed gardens.

 So canal barge gardens with,

 you know, canal barges in them.

 The gardens with old English pubs and thatch cottages

 and lovely hollyhocks and everything like that.

 All very lovely, all very chocolate boxy.

 And none of which I had any interest in.

 Nice to see them, but it’s Disneyland.

 So I think the home front program

 probably changed everything

 because that was deliberately contemporary

 and the producers there were challenging me.

 Challenging me on a weekly basis

 to do things differently and show garden.

 So I think that, would I say led a change

 was part of a change

 rather than the show gardens I did.

 Then when I went back to do show gardens,

 I deliberately went over the top to do stuff

 that I couldn’t necessarily do on the programs

 because of planning permission or whatever.

 Chelsea allowed you a different form to create

 what I felt was a little bit of magic.

 Other people might’ve felt differently about it,

 but some people loved them, some people didn’t.

 But I always found that interesting.

 I found the debate about them interesting.

 And I think it helped to move things on,

 but the thing that really moved things on

 were what people were seeing on telly.

 Right, okay.

 So with the flower shows,

 do you think there’s a space for there

 to be a contemporary section

 or do you think the contemporary work

 should just be invited in and encouraged

 within all the other show gardens?

 How do you think it should work?

 I don’t think it should be isolated.

 I think there should be,

 I think ideas should reign supreme

 and I think that people shouldn’t care about medals.

 I think standards are very important.

 I think you should have to prove yourself

 before you get in.

 But to say something different

 as part of the narrative of a show is important.

 If I don’t have a garden at Chelsea,

 I don’t go, I don’t watch.

 If I do have a garden at Chelsea,

 I go into the main gate

 and I find out where the loos are

 and then I find my garden and that’s all.

 They’re the only places I would go.

 I’m very kind of blinkered and single-minded

 about that type of thing.

 I think there should be a narrative

 where people should be excited by Chelsea

 and they should be excited by the gardens of Chelsea

 and they’re not.

 And I get that by osmosis.

 It’s the same, the same, the same.

 And designers are apprehensive

 about moving out of their safe space.

 And I think that is a shame

 because musicians aren’t, architects aren’t,

 fashion designers aren’t.

 I was gonna say, you look at the world of fashion,

 you can see coming down a catwalk,

 the most extraordinary things

 that you wouldn’t necessarily have in your wardrobe.

 And yet it’s this sort of fantastical event.

 You want to go see something

 that you’re not gonna have in your wardrobe.

 So as long as you have a deep belief in it

 and as long as you’re not just doing it for attention,

 which never works.

 And as long as you’re prepared to fail

 and as long as you don’t mind being part of a show

 that has the canal barge, the cottage,

 the kind of standard contemporary thing.

 Because I think people want to see a little bit

 of everything and decide on what they like.

 But I think gardens should challenge and confuse.

 I think they should be political.

 I think they should embrace technology.

 I think there’s all sorts of other things to say.

 And I think they should acknowledge

 what’s happening with our climate.

 So all these things have a part to play.

 But people won’t do it.

 And it is discouraged by maybe the judging panel who,

 I’m not sure the RHS know what makes a good show anymore.

 I think in the television age, people want more.

 And I always hoped somebody would come after us

 and do the type of thing that would make me really jealous

 or light a fire within me and make me want to go back.

 But it hasn’t really happened.

 But that’s fair enough because Chelsea still does well.

 The other shows aren’t doing so well,

 I think in Hampton Court,

 I think has gone to one every second year or something.

 Right, okay.

 I mean, they’ve just started a new one,

 RHS Badminton, haven’t they?

 Badminton, yeah.

 Which was last weekend.

 One up north as well.

 Oh yeah, that was a good one.

 That’s a good one.

 I think it’s get one up north, hasn’t it?

 I think that’s quite cool that they’ve done that

 because you get very different climate.

 Well, it was very cliquey as well, wasn’t it?

 Yeah.

 All down south.

 Yeah, it is very cliquey.

 No matter what, it’s very cliquey.

 I think it’s a great shame that they aren’t open

 to the more contemporary visions

 because it’s the whole point with any of this

 is it’s all about taste.

 So you’re not going to necessarily love everything

 that’s being shown and you shouldn’t either

 because there’s horses for courses.

 So you need to have things that really get you rethinking.

 Maybe it’s us,

 maybe it’s the garden design fraternity

 and the gardeners who are letting them down

 and letting the public down

 because if I got in

 and if I got in for a very long time

 with no track record initially in Britain

 and I received an amazing amount of support

 for so many years from the,

 and indeed encouragement to do things

 that were different,

 always staying within the rules and regulations.

 But maybe it’s us who need to,

 maybe it’s the garden designers.

 But isn’t that because they are being sponsored,

 the sponsors are wanting gold medals.

 So-

 Well, I always told the sponsor

 that they wouldn’t get a gold medal from me.

 So-

 But that’s all right

 because you’ve explained you’ve got all this other work

 but other garden designers don’t have much.

 Yeah, but at the start I hadn’t

 and at the start I found it very difficult

 to get that support

 but I was always adamant that from the start

 it wasn’t about medals.

 It was about,

 I once said being brave

 because being brave in garden design

 isn’t exactly-

 Being creative.

 Sounds silly, yeah.

 But just doing something different,

 trying something different

 and exploring things other than prettiness or pomposity.

 Yeah, there was a garden designer,

 I think it was Tom Massey,

 there are a couple of Massey’s,

 I’m not sure which one,

 but he was using AI for his garden at Chelsea

 the year before this one last year

 and he was using it from memory

 specifically for the trees and a watering system

 and so the AI could read when a tree needed watering

 and all that sort of thing.

 And there was a huge uproar about it

 and a lot of disparaging comments

 from the general public about that.

 Where do you stand on AI being used

 in the world of gardening?

 I think first of all,

 there’s always huge controversy over nothing at Chelsea

 whether it’s garden gnomes or feathers,

 you know, whatever.

 That, and it’s something that’s encouraged

 by the press office for, you know,

 because they like press talking about something.

 Where do I stand on AI?

 I think it’s a game changer.

 I think it’s amazing.

 I think I’m in a lucky position with AI

 because I already have a name,

 but the challenge comes for some,

 because very shortly AI,

 I mean, I went to see a project, a new project,

 at the weekend in Dublin as a favour to somebody

 for a developer and a friend of mine

 had put him in touch with me and I went down

 and an hour later I had a complete design

 for the guy and a complete spec sheet.

 And that was all through AI,

 but it was also through 30 years of knowledge,

 knowing exactly what would work,

 telling AI what would work

 and it coming up with the most amazing drawings.

 Yes, and suggestions for plants and whatever.

 So AI at the moment has taken the drudgery

 out of a lot of work

 and that includes garden design work

 and organising yourself.

 I use it all the time.

 I think it’s an amazing resource.

 I think there are the issues over the data centres

 and the cooling systems

 and the amount of water it uses.

 But if we don’t acknowledge that we’re not only

 in the world of AI,

 but we’re also in fast centre

 in the world of robotics and nanotechnology.

 So AI is just the most public facing

 of these new advancements.

 We’re in trouble.

 And that debate in a year’s time,

 which massively is going to seem so quenched.

 Because.

 So true.

 Yeah, we can’t fight it, can we?

 Because it’s here to stay.

 There’s nothing we’re going to be able to do about it.

 No, and there are other AIs.

 There was an AI released about six weeks ago

 and the US government after a few days

 told them to stop using it and called it back

 because it was so powerful

 that it could overturn states maybe.

 And then it was regulated in some way and it’s out again.

 So the AI we’re using now,

 whether that’s Claude or Chet, the GPT,

 what’s actually been built next level,

 that the next wave is going to be absolutely extraordinary.

 So yeah, there’s a lot of reassessment needs doing.

 But then we’re very lucky to be interested

 in gardens and the soil

 and to be in touch with something that’s very real.

 So to have the use of that technology,

 but to also know what it means to dig or to plant

 or to experience and understand the seasons.

 And our weather patterns is amazing and nature.

 Yeah, absolutely.

 Do you think, so obviously you have a name for yourself.

 Do you think garden designers who don’t have a name

 are their jobs in jeopardy with AI coming along?

 Yes, I do.

 I really do because there’s going to be AI garden designers.

 There’s going to be AI versions of me and Monty

 and everybody else because they’ll be,

 the big companies will monetize

 all of these type of things

 because they’ll make it,

 it’ll be another aid for people.

 I’m working on a piece of technology now called

 Garden Buddy or Garden Geoff or Garden Percy.

 That’s a machine that’ll go out in the garden

 and it’ll get to know your garden.

 It’ll tell you how many pollinators

 visited your garden yesterday and what you need.

 If you want to increase that,

 it’ll tell you about your soil.

 It’ll tell you everything.

 When you go out to the garden

 and you’re looking at your wisteria,

 it will watch you looking at your wisteria

 and it’ll talk to you and tell you how to prune it.

 So all these things are inevitable.

 Wait, so this is a robot

 that you’re looking at yourself now?

 It’s not a robot because a robot will move

 but it’s a piece of hardware.

 That you take with you out in the garden?

 Well, it lives out in the garden.

 So it’s cameras and probes and everything like that.

 So you’re using that in your garden currently?

 Not using it.

 We’re developing it at the moment in Hong Kong.

 When you say we, who’s we?

 Oh, people in that AI and that robotic,

 funnily enough.

 I’m dealing with somebody who has farms in Hong Kong

 that have no human involvement.

 So they’re in the city

 and they supply an enormous amount of food

 and it’s all AI and robotic arms

 developed universities out there.

 And I don’t know if it’ll end up,

 it probably will end up coming to market

 but I’m working on it to learn about it

 and also because if it has a possibility

 of coming to market,

 I’m in a good place to get it to market

 but it’s keeping me abreast of

 what’s happening in technology.

 Now, that same person is rewilding

 a thousand acres in Hampshire.

 So it’s not one or the other.

 Which is, you mentioned earlier about the data centres

 and we obviously are on the cusp of the Super El Nino

 and we’re already feeling the impact

 massively of climate change.

 Those data centres and the cooling farms

 and all those things that are associated with AI

 are of course contributing big time to the problem.

 So that person is developing this AI tool

 but it’s trying to sort of counterbalance that

 with planting a load of trees.

 Yes, planting a load of trees regenerates the farming

 and creating a venue for people to go

 and learn about all of this

 and why all of this is important.

 So if you’re in Hong Kong, it makes sense.

 If you want fresh food and don’t have access to land

 because Hong Kong is so tiny,

 it makes sense that in warehouses,

 rather than having data centres,

 you’d have a farm that’s producing

 good quality fresh food.

 But that person grew up on a hillside farm in Malaysia

 and they know about the soil

 and they’re obsessed about organic gardening

 and organic farming and helping people understand

 why that’s so important.

 So yes, hence the projects running side by side.

 Yeah, it’s such an interesting one, isn’t it?

 Because also if that person doesn’t do it,

 somebody else will and like I say,

 you can’t escape it, can you?

 So you might as well get the forefront of it.

 We’re quite behind on all this technology

 because in China now they have data centres

 for AI in the sea and they use sea water to cool these.

 So that reduces the amount of energy requirements

 for the coolers by I think 60%.

 So all of this is happening

 and there will be new technologies which will help.

 But one thing is for sure,

 because we’re not the ones in control of the money

 and the people who are in control of the money

 have the power and they won’t be stopping data centres.

 So Diarmuid, for your dream garden,

 what would be the garden boundary?

 Garden boundary would be a brick wall,

 an old brick wall from a wall garden or stone wall

 and are fed in at a hedge,

 but a brick wall would be a delightful backdrop.

 So what sort of wall are we thinking?

 A red brick, old fashioned?

 Maybe kind of beige-y, maybe a lighter color.

 Red can be quite hard to work against.

 Yeah, it’s quite stock.

 Yeah, yeah.

 Something that absorbs the heat during the day

 and radiates it back so the fruit can ripen at night.

 And something that you can have areas covered

 and have areas left unkept.

 Something that you can imagine,

 for all my contemporary leanings,

 that idea of the secret garden still is very attractive.

 Still in your mind.

 Surprisingly traditional, though, with your boundaries.

 Very traditional.

 Yes, I don’t think you do better than that, though.

 And when something has been perfected,

 it’s important to acknowledge that.

 And there’s plenty of garden styles

 that have been perfected

 and that would be wrong to go near.

 Well, as Sweet Peas Grandad would say,

 if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

 I guess we’re talking here.

 So there’s going to be no mechanical parts to this.

 Nothing’s going to pop out the top or out the side.

 Just the traditional.

 With the garden wall, I’d like a moat.

 Yes, great.

 Yes, so maybe a garden wall,

 but your garden is surrounded by a moat.

 And then, of course, you’d need something

 to come up and down.

 So that would be the mechanical aspects.

 OK, and how tall is your brick wall going to be?

 Oh, not too tall.

 You don’t want it to be like a prison for plants.

 Maybe three metres at tops.

 Tall enough to give protection to create a microclimate,

 depending on where the garden is, but not oppressively.

 Tall enough that you can clamber up on top of,

 because that’s what I tend to do in the garden,

 or any garden, clamber up to get a view, an overall view.

 OK, and do you want a gate beyond that to then have a view?

 I think gates are huge.

 Again, coming back to this idea of the secret garden,

 a gate, and again, a traditional gate, wrought iron,

 would be wonderful.

 Mind you, I saw a gate.

 Gilbert and George, who are contemporary artists,

 I think in Bermondsey, in East London, maybe,

 they maybe 10 or 15 years ago designed and commissioned

 a blacksmith to create a wonderful gate.

 So that’s the gate I’d like for.

 OK, what does it look like?

 It’s green.

 It has plenty of motifs on it.

 I think it probably was, they’re probably

 traditionalists at heart.

 They’re very contemporary in terms of their art.

 But I think it was in tribute to Queen Elizabeth.

 So I think it has some of that sort of stuff going on.

 I think it’s slightly Art Nouveau, and I don’t like Art Nouveau.

 I love deco, but not Nouveau.

 But this gate, you’ll be able to find it online, is magnificent.

 So that’s actually I want two gates.

 So I want one really traditional, one

 what you’d expect from a blacksmith from 150 years ago

 and the Gilbert and George.

 OK, two gates.

 OK, Gilbert and George one as well.

 And you mentioned, depending on where your garden is in terms of microclimate.

 So where are you envisaging it?

 Will it be where you are in County Mickle or will it be another country together?

 Definitely in Ireland.

 I think County Mickle would be a good place for us.

 Where I am is we’re just less than a mile from the sea.

 We have the mountains right beside us.

 The highest village in Ireland is 10 minutes up the road, 15 minutes up the road.

 So we have all that going on around us and we don’t get the extremes of water.

 Now, we will have a host by band from next week,

 but compared to other places, we won’t suffer as badly.

 So I think this would be a good place to to garden.

 So have you experienced any heat waves this year so far?

 Yeah, we’re in the middle of one now,

 but because I’ve been filming up in the north of Ireland,

 it’s been rain every day.

 Oh, right.

 But down here has been glorious weather.

 What temperatures are you experiencing?

 Oh, God, I’m very bad on temperatures.

 I’m very bad on numbers.

 OK. It’s been too.

 I’ve slept outside.

 I slept outside on the veranda.

 I put the mattress out.

 So that’s kind of hot.

 Oh, that’s bliss.

 Well, that’s a nice hot sleep outside.

 And do you get do you get very wet there?

 Yes, it gets very wet.

 So January, February were unbelievably wet.

 So it’s I think I did.

 I did a radio interview about the host band band yesterday,

 and I think it said rainfall has been one hundred and twenty three percent

 more than usual.

 But because I think March was so dry, it evened out.

 But the rain, it’s not the amount of rain.

 It is the patterns of rainfall.

 So it comes down in kind of tropical

 deluge, deluge.

 Yeah. And that causes damage, especially if you were in a on a hill.

 It would cause damage with erosion and flash floods and stuff like that.

 Flash floods.

 But even in the garden here, the garden doesn’t flood, but pools form.

 And they drain away soon afterwards.

 But things are changing.

 Do you get it frosty there as well?

 Very little. Very, very little.

 Now, we had when we had The Beast from the East

 eight years ago, maybe it got down to minus twenty five.

 So that was that was incredible.

 But most things survived amazingly.

 You have a lot of tree fans there. They’re not surviving.

 Yeah, they were they were all good.

 Did you wrap them?

 No, I never wrap anything. No.

 Oh, how did you do that then?

 It’s just I don’t know. I got lucky.

 So but with Dicksonias generally,

 it’s the moisture rather than the frost that gets them.

 And funny enough, that minus twenty five might have been one evening.

 But because there was snow, it insulates a lot of the plants.

 But even the bananas, even the purple banana,

 which would be tender, I leave that in the ground.

 And that is I just uncovered it yesterday from the brambles

 and the nettles because Carol is coming and it’s thriving.

 So would you in your dream garden, would you have your walled garden

 any closer to the sea or you happy being a mile away?

 I think a bit closer because Helen Dillon,

 she moved very near the sea and she moved into a walled garden.

 So she was a remarkable gardener, originally from Scotland,

 grew up in a kind of stately home.

 Her brother is in the House of Lords, I think.

 And she came to garden in Dublin 50 years ago,

 built a remarkable garden, town garden, one of the best in the world.

 And then for the last few years, moved out

 and built a walled garden in a place called Monkstown right by the sea.

 And I think she was often on gardeners where I know Monty came over.

 And I think he came over to see the new walled garden.

 Which is now gone because that house has been sold subsequently.

 So they got rid of the wall?

 I don’t know. The wall would remain.

 But I don’t know who purchased it.

 And I don’t know if they’re gardeners.

 And Helen never minded if somebody new came in and took over

 and did something different.

 So I would like to be, yes, that near the sea.

 I love the sea anyway.

 And during lockdown, I did the sea swimming at sunrise every day.

 So to be nearer and to be able to leave that wall gone

 and go out, jump in the sea.

 And also, so then I’d come in because I have my bath outside.

 I have the shower outside.

 Yeah, that’s on your veranda.

 On the veranda.

 But I’m planning on putting a shower in the greenhouse.

 So I would love to come back and have a shower in the greenhouse.

 Outdoor showers.

 Lovely.

 And what sort of size are we imagining your dream garden to be?

 I would like an acre.

 Just an acre.

 What do you have there at the moment?

 I’d say about a third or a quarter.

 It’s not big. It looks much bigger than it is on photographs.

 And we have to feel, there is a feel behind it

 so that the garden morphs into that.

 An acre would be fine because I’d garden

 fairly intensively and you don’t want to be,

 I don’t want to be a prisoner to the garden.

 No, you want to be able to relax.

 And everyone always talks about how in their gardens

 they don’t have time to sit down and actually enjoy it

 because they’re always gardening.

 Yes, I want to eat and drink in the garden.

 Yeah, that’s a good plan.

 Well then, would you like a shed or a greenhouse

 if you had to choose between the two?

 So I’m obsessed by both

 and sheds and garden buildings were a big feature of Homefront

 because each time they’d be little pieces of architecture.

 But I just have a brand new greenhouse, which is amazing.

 So it has to be greenhouse.

 Has to be greenhouse.

 So what type of greenhouse are we talking here?

 It is traditional.

 So I have a very traditional Victorian style

 timber and glass greenhouse, and it is painted white.

 It’s in the middle of the jungle and it is glorious.

 Oh, beautiful. How big is it?

 It’s again, that that would require numbers.

 OK, sure, sure.

 It’s a nice size.

 It’s you can fill it with plants and still have dinner in there.

 Oh, lovely. Table and chairs.

 Yes, yes. It’s a Hamptons greenhouse.

 They make the oranges and I work with them.

 So I’ve been dreaming of that for years

 and it arrived about a month ago and it’s remarkable.

 But also, I’m about to build an orange tree.

 So under the veranda is all going to be enclosed.

 So that will become an indoor outdoor.

 So orange and greenhouse.

 Is the orange tree going to be because you double floored veranda?

 You’ve got. Yes.

 Is it going to be on the ground floor?

 It’s going to be on the ground floor.

 So it’s going to be inside of the cast iron pillars.

 So in that area behind me there.

 So I’ve just taken out the cooker.

 So where that opening is.

 Is that just a hole in your wall there?

 No, I’ve got two lovely doors there now, but they’re open.

 OK, so we moved the cooker and that will lead into the orange tree.

 How fantastic.

 That’s super.

 Just bliss to have an orange tree.

 I like your greenhouse.

 Again, interesting that you’ve gone so traditional with it.

 Yes. Yeah.

 Are you planting in the ground and there is everything in pots?

 No, everything is in pots because it went on a tiled floor.

 So I already had the terrace made about seven years ago

 and caustics meant tiles in a daisy pattern.

 So I’m planting in massive Italian terracotta pots.

 And again, because we’ve been away,

 I haven’t really started the planting yet.

 I have lemon trees, two large lemon trees in there,

 which are amazing, and comquats and various other bits and pieces.

 But I miss the season because I’ve been away

 and also because even though my wife is a gardener,

 if I don’t water, nobody’s going to go midway down the garden.

 I do just want to ask you about those cement tiles.

 So they look quite ornate from what I’ve seen online.

 How are they made?

 Are they cement with a print put into them?

 No, it’s all powder.

 So they’re made by pressure.

 First of all, amazing, intricate designs done in metal kind of frames.

 And then they put a bit of cement in, which is in dust.

 So it’s dry cement.

 And then the colours are all in the powder form too.

 And then it’s just pressure.

 Oh, I see.

 So they’re not fired or anything like that.

 It’s just pressure.

 And then so all handmade in the most brilliant range of colours.

 And yeah, love them.

 And they handle being power jet washed.

 Yeah, yes, yes.

 Does the colour fade?

 It fades a little bit.

 But again, mine are done.

 I did everything wrong.

 So I meant to seal them loads of times.

 You meant to seal and then seal them every year.

 Mine come up like a dream if I get the power

 power washer on the jet wash on them.

 So no, just good quality ones will keep the

 will keep.

 And because I knew seven years ago I was going to put a greenhouse in,

 I have the pipes for under floor heating.

 So eventually I will do an air source heat

 bumper in the garden and run heating for under the orange tree

 and the greenhouse from that.

 Oh, amazing.

 And then the hot tiles on the floor when you come in from the swim,

 having the shower. Yes, exactly.

 Surrounded by the lemon trees.

 Yeah, it’s going to be lovely.

 This is a dream gone.

 Everything takes forever, but everything eventually gets there.

 Because you’re so busy, I imagine.

 Yeah, and everything I have expensive taste.

 So I have to save the pennies, then you can get it.

 Yes. Any other intricacies that you want to have in your greenhouse?

 Little bits and pieces.

 A record player playing music on vinyl,

 but I have to make something to house it because that won’t go well

 with the heat.

 So that’s the plan to get a great source of music down there.

 The shower and coffee making facilities.

 Yes. And what music are we listening to in your dream greenhouse?

 We’re listening to soul and jazz and something to process pot,

 which my daughter will want me to pot.

 Yeah, cannabis. Yeah. Oh, I see. OK.

 Yes. So the greenhouse must be a place for growing some cannabis, I think.

 Very interesting.

 That’s the first time we’ve had cannabis growing in the dream greenhouse.

 Well, I think it’s the first time that people have been honest.

 Being honest. Yeah, exactly.

 I could tell you that Monty Donne’s got it in his greenhouse, I’m sure.

 I can’t quite picture Monty Donne with cannabis.

 If anybody needs it, it’s Monty.

 Well, talking about plants,

 what would be your five favourite ornamentals for your dream garden?

 Five favourite ornamentals, probably starting with the Dicksonia,

 because since I was a kid and I saw them down in a garden

 called Doreen in County Kerry, I’ve been obsessed then.

 Well, with those, so we know a lot of people.

 So, for example, I’m thinking of Anne-Marie and Andrew,

 who have 50 Shades of Green, a beautiful tropical garden

 in the Midlands, and they have a very laborious process

 of wrapping everything up for the winter months.

 Are you suggesting that they could just leave their Dicksonias?

 Well, in the Midlands, in England or in England?

 I don’t know, because I would hate to give that advice.

 I’ve done a lot of reading about Dicksonias

 and I’ve seen them in all sorts of places around the world.

 From and the guy I regard as the expert

 is the guy who used to own, I can’t remember his name, Angus.

 He owned architectural plants until recently.

 He wrote an awful lot about them.

 And he said, generally, it’s not the cold.

 Generally, he also said, you can’t give a particular temperature

 that they’re hardy to, it depends on that particular plant.

 And he said, generally, the issue is them not being watered.

 Through the ground, watered and losing them through

 through cold or frost.

 So I wouldn’t advise anybody in.

 So if you had sustained frost or sustained

 snow, which you might get in the Midlands in Britain or Ireland,

 maybe you do have to.

 But if I did have to, I wouldn’t grow them,

 because I don’t want to look out of my garden and see anything wrapped.

 And one of the beauties of them

 at the moment, like I’ll try and I’ll see if this works

 just by looking through the window.

 Oh, wow, beautiful.

 So I would.

 So they’re badly placed.

 It’s just I’m blocking at the our very lovely neighbors.

 But this is the the kitchen.

 And actually, I’m really blocking the garage, which is just

 just over there.

 But I have that view all year round.

 And then I have them under lit at night.

 Oh, pretty.

 And then this one here.

 Where’s my fingers?

 It’s hard when I’m sideways.

 Maybe not.

 What do I do?

 Oh, I go that way.

 Yeah, that way.

 That is the stem of a Dicksonia.

 Oh, that’s the stem.

 Yeah. So I made yes or something.

 So that is a 12 foot Dicksonia.

 And again, summer and winter, I have the canopy.

 So I won’t grow anything that needs cover.

 Now I have some glass plushes and now that I have a greenhouse

 and I intend to be out in the garden through the winter,

 I might put glass.

 I have some old Victorian glass plushes.

 I might put them over the bananas.

 But we’ll see.

 OK, very interesting.

 So you talked about how you saw Dicksonias in the garden

 when you were younger and that kind of really interested you.

 Where did you kind of I know that in another interview

 you talked about how you’re kind of gardening.

 You first kind of were introduced to it in a way when your dad

 and uncle were doing the garden at your home.

 And then kind of where did it go from there afterwards?

 Willy Wonka, I think.

 So that my dad and my uncle, who weren’t

 creative gardeners, I was just fascinated

 by the change of space.

 But then Percy Trower on Blue Peter

 and creating a sunken Italianate garden,

 the same one that I visited with Primal Scream.

 Wow. Must have been an experience having seen it as a kid

 and then you got to go and have free rein.

 Well, yes, it was.

 And all our programs were all the home for programs anywhere

 were made from East Tar, which was right beside which was

 beside Television Centre.

 So I got to I can imagine the first time I would have seen it.

 And we had keys to the BBC.

 I lived five minutes up the road on a Saturday evening.

 I’d drive five minutes down the road,

 try and dance on Strictly and then drive home.

 Yes, of course you did.

 So it was that our

 eventually in London, our proximity to Television Centre was amazing.

 And my proximity to the Blue Peter garden gardener.

 And I’m sure I did.

 I’m sure I filmed a few things with Blue Peter.

 But on Blue Peter, also, they did this film report of

 the making of Willy Wonka, the original

 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory movie.

 And seeing that garden as a kid really energised me.

 Did you go on? What did you go on to study?

 Or did you study in horticulture afterwards?

 I studied amenity horticulture,

 which is a broad term for nice, pretty gardening.

 Just ornamental gardening, I suppose.

 But I studied in the Botanic Gardens and the best.

 The college wasn’t good.

 It’s better now. But back then, it was terrible.

 And a lot of our lectures, of which there were five,

 a lot of our lectures shouldn’t have been lecturing.

 But half a day every day, we were working on section with gardeners.

 So that’s where the learning was done.

 And also colleagues, classmates who were avid gardeners.

 That’s where I think I learned an awful lot.

 And then when I started creating gardens myself, you learn on the job.

 And in gardening, you never stop learning.

 And hopefully you never stop developing and, you know,

 getting better at your craft and your trade.

 Yeah, absolutely.

 So what would you what would you recommend if there were young people

 wanting to get into gardening?

 Would you recommend going down the academic route?

 Or would you say maybe, you know what, just stop working directly,

 start getting your hands in the earth and learn from there?

 I’d say do a little of everything.

 If you’re lucky enough to have access to a garden or space

 where you can grow, which not everybody is.

 But if you are lucky enough, I would just show the interest

 and start gardening wherever, really, wherever you can.

 I use garden in a local park because the type of gardening I wanted to do.

 I went up underneath the trees and started making my own garden

 because I would have been run out of my parents garden.

 Wanting to change things around.

 So do what you can do.

 I would say certainly get some formal training in whatever way.

 And so much is available online now.

 Then if you want to be a garden designer, I would attach myself.

 And you’re finding it hard to get a placement.

 I would just make myself indispensable to a place.

 And if you can afford to give some time,

 if there’s a studio that you particularly like and insist that they employ you,

 I think you have to do take extreme measures sometimes

 if you want to, if you have a very definite dream

 that you want to volunteer.

 Volunteering is great, especially in Britain.

 It’s a great tradition of that.

 And even that, you know, gardens as Chelsea

 or other shows around the country, people are always looking for,

 you know, people to help out.

 Yeah, absolutely.

 And maybe do a Chelsea garden for 300 quid

 and start from there and work your way up.

 You have to be a little bit mad or obsessional or deluded to do that.

 I wouldn’t recommend that to any of you as an approach.

 No. Anyways, what would be the other ornamentals?

 So other equiums, I love equiums.

 Equium, the perennial one, candy can is a great one.

 Mind you, that’s too tender for this garden that I’ve grown that

 a few times and lost it after about four or five years.

 Wisteria, again, because I have the veranda

 and I have these cast iron columns for plants to clamber up.

 I love the Wisteria when it’s in in floor.

 And yeah, really gorgeous.

 Yeah. A fragrant one, yours?

 No, not particularly.

 And they’re leftover.

 So I don’t even know which leftover from projects are donated.

 When I was in the garden, a lot of this garden evolves at a time

 where again, when I was never here and batches of plants

 would just arrive left over from Chelsea or something like that.

 Oh, that’s really nice.

 Yeah, but no great original plan.

 And then, you know, seven years in and around, you realize,

 bloody hell, I have a garden here.

 Yeah. I have to shape it in some form.

 And I don’t grow anything particularly well.

 So our soil is very bad.

 Our soil is really bad.

 I wasn’t here when the contractors were meant to be doing everything properly.

 So I broke all the rules,

 met all the mistakes that I advise people not to make.

 And it’s only in the last four or five years that I’m beginning to reclaim it.

 And, you know, yesterday I had another five tons of good

 composted material delivered and slowly but surely I’ll,

 you know, improve right away down the garden.

 I don’t I hadn’t pruned.

 So the Wisteria just went mad for years.

 And it was only last winter that I stripped all the climbers,

 including the Wisteria back.

 And next year we’ll get the results of that.

 So I was more interested in growth for growth’s sake.

 And even with the Wisteria, I have another great climber up there

 called Holbelia and Holbelia is evergreen.

 So like the Dicksonia, that gives me a green cover.

 That has a great flower.

 Insignificant looking, but the scent is amazing.

 I got a lot of Star Jasmine, too.

 That’s doing really well this year.

 And Rose Gertrude Jekyll, again, didn’t prune properly, didn’t feed properly.

 But now I’m beginning to give more time to the garden,

 beginning to get all of that in order.

 Yes. When you say that your soil isn’t good,

 in what respect are you saying you didn’t have?

 It’s just hard.

 It’s compact, hard.

 Lots of shale in it.

 Very little good growing stuff in it.

 So almost to plant anything, you have to get a Kango hanger hammered out.

 Right. And plants just haven’t been happy.

 So I, you know, was gardening with a pickaxe for so long.

 And I had no time to spend in the garden because I was everywhere else

 but here. If I was lucky, I’d get here at the weekend

 and, you know, then get lost in the garden.

 But again, that’s all the last few years, four or five years

 beginning to change and I’m beginning to enjoy it and dig some good stuff into it.

 Well, on the ornamentals front, I’ve got Dicksonia Echiums Wisteria

 and then you did rattle off a lot more than five.

 So what else have I written here?

 Gertrude Jekyll, Rose Gertrude Jekyll.

 As much to represent all the David Austin roses

 and also to represent that gardening tradition.

 I did a documentary series for BBC four on an episode on Gertrude Jekyll

 and Miriam Margulais played Gertrude Jekyll.

 Oh, yeah. So that was that was fun.

 That’s good. And what else was it?

 Dicksonia, Rose, the Hardy Bamboo.

 Hardy Bamboo. Yeah, the purple banana.

 I think the Echium and the Wisteria will probably round out that.

 Well, then what would be your five favourite edible plants?

 So tomatoes, spuds, potatoes,

 lemon tree, because I’m obsessed since I’ve grown them.

 The peppers, again, because of the new greenhouse,

 so chilli peppers and the whole range of herbs.

 So everything you can imagine, the whole herb garden.

 So in your garden there, do you have a dedicated edible growing area?

 No, no, that’s a problem because it’s what I started doing.

 So originally, before I did anything else,

 I had raised beds immediately outside the back door or with everything in it.

 But then being away for 23rd.

 Well, we’re here for 18 years, maybe 19 years,

 being away for all those years.

 So travelling all the time.

 If you’re not there, you can’t grow a veg.

 So the garden was taken over by plants.

 I’ve slightly got with the greenhouse.

 That will be the main place for growing edibles.

 But also I have a next door neighbour and that’s helpful.

 There’s an area down the end of their garden that they don’t use.

 So maybe I will make a proposition to them.

 One says that I’d move in.

 I used the field at the back of the house for that, for growing something.

 But in the future, maybe.

 But maybe that’s passed to maybe I just won’t be able to.

 And there’ll just be greenhouse gardening.

 Or maybe I’ll grow a veg in pots and containers outside the greenhouse.

 That might be a nice idea.

 Yeah, that could be correct.

 OK, yeah, lovely.

 So in your dream garden, would you want to have a dedicated patch?

 Not stealing from your neighbours or the farmer’s mills at the back.

 Would you have in your acre?

 Yes, I would definitely want an allotment size vegetable garden.

 Would you be having it in a kind of mono crop?

 So kind of in rows?

 Or are you thinking of having kind of a whole mix of things?

 So we’re talking a bit of ornamentals, a bit of edibles all together.

 No, mono.

 I would have it very ordered and very controlled.

 I think so.

 I wouldn’t mix it with the ornamental because it wouldn’t get any light.

 It won’t be able to outgrow everything else that’s in the garden.

 So it would have to be ordered and making the best use of space as possible.

 Interesting. Well, then, would you like a pond or a pool?

 And what plant would you have in that area?

 I would like a pool,

 because I think with climate change,

 I have ponds, I have a couple of ponds in the garden, great for wildlife,

 teeming with life.

 But now I think I would like the pool

 because once the orange area goes in, I’ve done an illustration,

 Kirov AI, which shows the house as it could be.

 And there’s a lap pool made from a shipping container,

 sunk immediately outside those doors.

 So I think that’s interesting what I’d like to put there.

 And I’d like to swim summer and winter.

 So heated. Heated.

 Yeah. OK. You want to swim lengths as well.

 Yes. Is this shipping container sunk into the ground?

 Is this a tried and tested way of doing a swimming pool?

 Yes, it is.

 Yeah. So you can get you can get them done.

 I’d probably get a friend to make it for me.

 But you can. Yeah.

 If you go online, you can see them.

 They’re quite standard.

 So how does it work? The shipping container goes in.

 Then do you put blocks in and a line up?

 No, you just use it as you can use a liner,

 but you can just use it as a shipping container.

 You can seal it up and paint it.

 And you just take out the wood.

 There’s welding to be done at both ends where the doors are.

 And then you separate a compartment for the filter and the heat and all that.

 So it’s a very practical solution and quite, you know,

 if it’s 40 foot long or you can get them 30 or 20 foot 40 foot long

 and just eight foot wide, it’s a good amount, decent size.

 Yeah. You don’t get a shallow end, though.

 No, you could build that in.

 You could weld that into it. Yeah.

 As it was being fabricated.

 And then you’d have a normal swimming pool filtration system put in.

 It’s a pool house with all your.

 Yeah. And all of these things, which seemed very strange

 are becoming domestic size now and affordable.

 So things like saunas, every young person around here is into,

 you know, spending £25 for 40 minutes in a sauna.

 Hot tubs are huge.

 So all of those toys are finding their time.

 Ice baths, ice baths, all of that.

 And so they all need to be considered for the new garden.

 And so I’m just intrigued by the shipping container.

 So presumably you couldn’t have a saltwater pool

 because it would just erode, erode it.

 Oh, but then you just put the liner in.

 So you could use the the structure

 as the the shipping container, as your structure, as your strength

 and just put the liner in.

 So in your dream garden, are you going to have saltwater

 or you can have chlorinated pool?

 Chlorinated. I don’t like the idea of it.

 But actually, when I’ve been in pools, it’s never bothered me.

 So, yeah, yeah, yeah, yes.

 All right. A question I also wanted to ask is,

 do you have a background in mechanical engineering?

 Because all of the good question inventions that you create for your gardens

 and then the stuff that you’re doing in your own kind of garden

 and your house is it’s not something that everyone does.

 It’s very, very no.

 I know I don’t.

 And I would again, mathematics numbers.

 I would have been terrible at any of that.

 I had an average interest in Lego.

 So I think, oh, that’s all the light sweepy

 Lego making that’s coming into.

 Right. Yeah.

 It’s all starting to make sense.

 Do you have a car now?

 We didn’t go to. No, we did.

 But it didn’t do it for me.

 Lego did it for me.

 And contemporary Lego doesn’t do it for me with all the kids.

 The basic Lego. Yeah. Yeah.

 Exactly. Very cool.

 So we’re going with the shipping container in the ground chlorinated.

 Are you wanting to have it so that there is a gentle drop

 or are you wanting it the same depth each end?

 And I, I would.

 I’d want to dive in.

 So I’m doing my legs.

 So diving board. No shallow end.

 However, if there were to be any grandchildren, maybe.

 Yes. What about when you’ve got company dumps,

 not just you on your own in your shipping container?

 I’m very happy.

 Or it is going to be you on your own in your shipping container.

 Yeah. Well, we went when I was at this estate in Hampshire

 and I brought some of my team over and there were

 it was three in the morning and my team and the team from that

 the chefs from the house were dive bombing the pool at three in the morning.

 So, yeah, I I’m trying to be very grown up about it,

 but I can see the mayhem.

 So, yeah, absolutely.

 Well, you have views of the sea from your pool.

 Oh, no, but no, not from the pool.

 But what I’m planning on is with the house is creating a widow’s peak.

 So a widow’s peak is a platform, a decked platform

 that they would put on houses in places like South Carolina.

 So all the officers and skippers wives

 would watch the ships from the rooftop

 go out, sail away and sail back.

 And it was called a widow’s peak because many wouldn’t come back.

 So I’m planning on a deck on the top of this house at some stage.

 Because we will see the sea from that.

 That is incredible.

 And very understanding neighbors you’ve mentioned already.

 So they’re not going to mind you peering over the top of them all.

 I think so.

 I think that would be fine.

 But actually, when you’re up at that height, you don’t see into the neighbors.

 You’re too near them.

 So you see beyond them.

 And, you know, when I had to get planning permission,

 when the council arrived, when I put up the veranda

 and I had to get planning permission,

 and that took a year and a half.

 And what did it in the end was all the neighbors writing in support of it.

 So, oh, lovely.

 Yeah, it’s nice.

 Very, very nice neighbors.

 And just to check.

 So this is in your garden.

 You can’t see the sea from your pool.

 In your dream garden as well.

 I guess you’ve got your walled gardens.

 If you’re sunken, you can’t.

 Well, no, I have another answer for that.

 I want to do a garden, you know, like a Chinese pagoda.

 Yes. Has all these different levels.

 I want to do a building that’s a bit like that.

 And not only do I want to do and I intend to do them,

 that you go into this building, you press a button and it goes up

 and up and up.

 So you’re getting views maybe out to the sea or maybe just.

 Looking down into the garden.

 Last year, I was going to do an umpire’s chair.

 The week of Wimbledon, I decided to do an umpire’s chair,

 but a really tall one.

 And I got onto the company that makes them so that you climb up.

 But you can also have roses rambling up and you just sit there

 and look at the garden, because I climb up on everything

 to get views of the garden.

 We have the veranda.

 So one of my next projects will be a garden,

 a seating place in a building

 that elevates, that robotically goes up.

 So you’re sitting there and you press a button,

 you get shot up into the sky.

 You get shot up into the sky.

 Nobody can annoy you.

 You can annoy nobody.

 And you have a structure that’s there and isn’t there

 because it goes back down.

 Yeah, I’ve done it on a television show,

 so I know it’s possible.

 Right. What show did you do it on?

 It was the Irish version of DIY S.O.S.

 It’ll be on my Instagram feed.

 It’s a octagonal building in the shape of a Caribbean

 house, or in the style of a Caribbean house.

 So that the girl who was in a wheelchair

 was able to go in and press a button on it.

 Fantastic. That’s very cool.

 And finally, just for your pool area,

 what would be the one plant that you’ll have there?

 For the pool area, Iris, I love Iris.

 So I think marginal Iris growing in a damp spot

 beside the pool.

 And candelabra primulus.

 Yeah, that’s good.

 There’s a great garden very near.

 Mount Usher Gardens in Ashford and County Wick,

 that’s about 10 minutes away,

 actually voted the number one gardener,

 garden in the world by readers

 of Gardener’s World magazine some time ago.

 And that has the most amazing collection of primulus.

 Beautiful. And they’re all hybridized.

 Yes.

 Like watercolors.

 So sorry, just on this sunken pool,

 this is going to be in amongst undergrowth

 rather than being paved around the side.

 Yes, definitely.

 I’ll send you an image of all that

 because as I say, I’ve done it.

 So yes, there’s planting.

 There’s a lot of planting ready.

 Actually, I think I’ve put Dicksonias in.

 No surprise there,

 because I would love to swim in

 under the fronds of the Dicksonias.

 Well, what would be your one statement tree

 for the garden?

 The Killarney strawberry tree, Arbutus unido.

 Oh my gosh, going to have to look that up.

 Killarney strawberry tree.

 Killarney, K-I-L-L-A-R-N-E-Y.

 So it’s a very unusual evergreen.

 Produces a strawberry style fruit.

 It looks almost like a lychee fruit.

 It does.

 Yes, yeah.

 That’s incredible.

 I’ve never heard of this.

 Yeah, so they’re native to Ireland.

 They’re an unusual tree to be native,

 but they’re the slow growing, gorgeous,

 gorgeous bark evergreen,

 and you get the fruit and the flower on

 often at the same time.

 And the fruits taste like a strawberry?

 No, not so pleasant, yeah.

 You don’t eat it?

 No.

 Is that with a stone in the middle?

 I think, well, because you don’t eat,

 if you stay well away.

 Don’t touch it.

 Yeah, I think there is a stone in the middle,

 but they’re slow growing,

 but as they mature, they’re just beautiful.

 I have one down the end of the garden.

 Right, so what sort of height are they getting to?

 Oh, they would reach 30 meters eventually,

 20 to 30 meters.

 Well, finally, what would be your favourite

 seating area, drink, and plant to have in that area?

 So the seating area will be the one that rises.

 Yeah, the elevator.

 And drink to have in it would be

 a nice glass of red wine, and plant.

 Any particular red wine?

 A particular?

 Oh no, I’m terrible.

 Any other?

 Merlot, Melbeck, Pinot Noir.

 Fruity, something nice and fruity.

 And plant, I would like, oh yeah,

 there is a Chatham Island birch,

 because that is a very tall, very slender tree.

 So the building would be going up and examining.

 It’s not the nicest looking tree in the world,

 but it just always amuses me

 how it grows so straight up, up, up.

 So the building going up beside it

 would be very amusing to pass by the tree

 as you went up.

 I really like that idea.

 What’s the name of the tree again?

 A Chatham Island birch.

 I don’t know the Latin name.

 I’m just having a look

 so that I know exactly what you’re talking about.

 A Chatham Island birch.

 It’s very strange.

 I’ve only come across it once,

 and I bought it, and I gave it to somebody,

 and it grew very well in his garden,

 but I think he’s chopped it down.

 Oh, interesting.

 Well, I can’t find it.

 I can’t find it either.

 Chatham Island plants doesn’t give Chatham Island birch.

 I must find out what that is.

 Yes, I’d be interested.

 Because this is what he called it,

 so I must find out what it was.

 Okay.

 It’s a brilliant tree.

 Tall and straight.

 Tall and straight.

 And quite ugly.

 Ah, quite ugly.

 Which is why Alfred must have taken it down,

 but yeah, I can’t find it.

 But I’ll follow up with that.

 Oh, I can’t find it here.

 What appeals to you about it?

 Just how odd it was.

 And also because of the one that I did get,

 so a kind of nutty professor

 who had an amazing plant nursery

 with rare and unusual species

 in the suburbs of Dublin grew it,

 and I gave it to my friend,

 and my friend lives in a house called Cork Lodge,

 which is just a bit a mile from here,

 and Cork Lodge is the house that Dickens heard of

 when he was in Dublin,

 and you know the house that the lady

 who was jilted at the altar

 was at Great Expectations or whatever,

 so she sat in her wedding dress

 for the rest of her life in this dishevelled house.

 So that’s the house,

 and outside that window,

 we planted a Chatham Island birch,

 which may be as much of a fiction now

 as Dickens currently.

 We’ll find out.

 We shall find out.

 Well, I’m going to read back to you,

 your dream garden,

 just in case I’ve missed anything,

 I’ve got anything wrong.

 So first of all, we’re going for one acre.

 It’s going to be pretty much where you are,

 but nearer to the sea, if possible.

 You still want to have view of the mountains

 around you,

 and you’re going to have the shower

 and the greenhouse, that kind of thing.

 We’re going with an old brick wall,

 but kind of beigey tones,

 not that stark red.

 Three meters high so you can climb on it.

 A moat around it and a drawbridge, very important.

 You want two gates,

 one iron kind of blacksmith made,

 custom made Queen Elizabeth Art nouveaumlook,

 and the other one a Gilbert & George gate.

 Then you’re going to have a greenhouse.

 We’re going very traditional as well on this,

 Victorian white timber frame.

 You’re going to have lots of pots in there.

 You can have these cement tiles,

 and you also want things like a rattle player

 and a coffee maker in there as well.

 Very important.

 Then your five ornamentals.

 We had Dicksonia, Echium, Candicans, Wisteria,

 Rosa Gertrude Jekyll, and Hardy Bamboo as well.

 And also we have-

 Hardy Banana.

 Hardy Banana, sorry.

 Yeah, the purple one.

 And then your five edibles.

 We’re wanting them in lines, nicely ordered.

 We have tomatoes, potatoes, lemon tree,

 chili peppers, and a herb garden as well.

 Your one tree was an Arbutus Unedo.

You wanted a shipping container

 in-ground heated swimming pool.

 So you can swim lengths it.

 It’s going to be chlorinated.

 You’re going to have Dicksonias around you.

 You’re going to have the Widows Peak

 decked platform nearby.

 And also Iris in there and Candelabra primulas.

 And then finally your seating area

 is the incredible elevator seating area.

 You’re going to have a fruity red wine,

 whatever that one is called,

 and a Chatham Island birch,

 if we can find that for you.

 If it exists.

 If it exists.

 The only other thing there, the banana,

 the purple banana isn’t Hardy,

 so it’ll have to take its chances.

 There is a-

 Yeah.

 Musa basjoo is hardy,

 but the purple Insetta isn’t.

 But it’ll take its chances,

 and it’s always done okay.

 Okey-dokey.

 Well, we’ll pop that in there.

 So how does that sound?

 Sounds perfect.

 Sounds like it’s a lot of what you either have done

 or are going to be doing in your garden.

 Yes.

 It’s all the dream.

 Well, I’ve really appreciated your time, Diarmuid.

 Thank you so much.

 And hope the filming goes well next week

 with your mystery visitor, Carol.

 Mystery.

 The garden’s all ready for her arrival.

 Thank you very much.

 I’ve really enjoyed it.

 There’s been A Good Old Chit-Chat with Diarmuid.