Growing communities of resilience come rain or shine

We invite you to our 2025 spring seminar where we have gathered our industry’s leaders to speak about what resilience means in our gardens. From our planting choices to supporting communities of life, we will explore how to approach the climatic pressures our gardens face whatever the weather. 

The day will be made up of two talks:

• Biodiverse Rain Gardens: The Resilience of Small Things with Wendy Allen
  Sustainable drainage systems, like our changing climate, are still something relatively new. SuDS consist of many smaller components which together manage surface water. Biodiverse rain gardens and rain planters are two small SuDS components that are achievable in a retrofit garden setting with the knowledge, creativity and environmental understanding that a design professional can give.

  This presentation uses the handy metaphor of a level and layered understanding to show what garden and landscape designers, architects and skilled gardeners can bring to help ensure small SuDS solutions provide resilience in our changing climate. Examples of filtration rain planters and infiltration rain gardens from some of Wendy Allen's retrofit surface water projects illustrate how their layers and considered planting facilitates natural processes to increase climate resilience even in small garden spaces. Wendy aims to inspire others to put rainwater, our most valuable resource, first in every design.

• Can rewilding help build resilience in gardens? – the view from Knepp with Moy Fierheller & Suzi Turner

  The rewilded walled garden at Knepp's pioneering rewilding project in Sussex is the site of a 5-year biodiversity experiment designed by Tom Stuart-Smith and James Hitchmough. Transitioned from a croquet lawn and Kitchen Garden into a self-willed biodiversity experiment and edible ecosystem, the project contains over 1000 plant species, set in a topographical landscape made from recycled crushed farm buildings. This box of experimentation will be introduced through a series of images and discussion by Moy Fierheller and Suzi Turner Joint deputy head gardeners, looking at how rewilding can help build resilience in UK gardens. 

And two panel discussions:

• The Power of Water: ecological design and innovative approaches for resilient landscapes
  Chair: Jo McKerr (Ecological Landscape consultant and writer)
  Panellists: Lili Barras-Hargan (Glasshouse Horticulturist at RBG Edinburgh), Jo Gibbons (Landscape Architect at JL Gibbons) and Kevin Twyford (Head LA at London Borough of Newham).

• Creating communities of change: Right people, right plants, right place!
  Chair: Humaira Ikram (Studio Ikram)
  Panellists: Alex Antoniou (Leahurst Nursery / Plantsman), Kevin Martin (Head of Tree Collections & Arboriculture at RBG Kew) and Toby Shuall (Planting & Garden Designer & nursery owner of Zophian Plants)

Your ticket price includes:

• A vegan lunch and refreshments

• Entry to Kew, so you'll have a chance to explore the garden during breaks and when the seminar finishes

We hope you'll enjoy learning and digesting this years’ seminar themes and meeting new and old friends in the industry.

Location: Lady Sainsbury Lecture Theatre, RBG, Kew, TW9 3DS