The brand new series of Super Garden sees 5 new budding designers battling it out to secure a coveted show garden spot at Ireland’s premier garden festival, Bord Bia’s ‘Bloom’. Riverside in Kells is a new social housing development built by Meath County Council and it’s the home for this years’ Super Garden series.
Five brand new budding designers from across the country, will each be given an identical garden in the estate as their blank canvas to create a show garden for the residents. The winner will secure a coveted show garden spot at Bord Bia’s Bloom garden show. Our designers have two weeks to design and three weeks to build their show gardens for their residents. Each designer has a budget of €15,000 which includes €5,000 for Irish grown planting.
EPISODE 2:
DESIGNER – KATHLEEN BARRETT
Episode Two’s Designer, Kathleen Barrett from Limerick has a wealth of horticulture, gardening and landscaping experience. She’s worked in the business for 34 years but she’s also an accomplished floral artist and has won Gold medals at Bloom for her creations. No stranger to competition she’s also competed in floral art, at Chelsea and other international competitions. A busy lady, she runs a donkey sanctuary in spare time – she’s ready to take on her biggest challenge yet, to design a garden worthy of Bloom.
Kathleen’s homeowners are the Majzel family from Poland. They want a garden with social area for chilling out, some plants and specifically a dedicated area for their eight year old son Jacob who is very active.
Kathleen has two weeks to design and three weeks to build a garden that will give the Majzels what they’re looking for plus impress the judges. With the help of her husband Tommy, Kathleen embarks on a brave design journey but can she bring home gold?
Designer: Kathleen Barrett, Co. Limerick
Occupation: Horticulturist, Limerick City County Council
Kathleen is a passionate determined gardener. She is married to Tommy and lives in Valley View Heights 146-acre animal welfare equine retirement farm and beef farm on the border between west Limerick and north Kerry. Kathleen has been gardening for 34 years and is a qualified horticulturalist for the last 28 years. She owned and ran her own small garden centre for 14 years, but as she was doing it on her own, she found it too much to keep up with that and the equine farm. Presently Kathleen works with Limerick City and County council Parks as a Craft Gardener. She also worked with Kerry Education & Training board as a horticulture tutor. She spends most of my time on her three-acre garden in Valley View, where she loves to farm, garden, and enjoy the company of her 10 horses, 19 donkeys, and five dogs. She has won awards for her Floral art and design at Bloom and Chelsea and also has won in the world flower show in Jaipur, India.
Homeowners:
The Majzel family are originally from Poland but moved to Ireland in 2011 for a better life. Dad Sebastian moved first to secure work before bringing his wife Barbara and two children – Alijca (now 19) and son Jacob (now 8). Now they’ve found a home in Riverside, Kells.
Barbara works at a Polish school while Sebastian works for a local pharmaceutical company. Daughter Alicja is the fluent English speaker in the family. Having just moved to Riverside the family have undertaken some planting in their garden but they are delighted to hand over the reins to Kathleen. Their key requirement is somewhere dedicated to son Jacob to play. An active eight year old he likes water and running around. Can Kathleen understand their requirements and deliver the garden they want!
Garden Design: Floral Fantasy
Kathleen’s garden design uses straight pathways & angular shapes – can it deliver on her floral promise and get her to Bloom? Her flower bed on the left hosts colourful perennials AND a floral art installation. In the top left corner an open timber pergola provides the gardens key area for socialising. While at the rear, triangular raised-planters support floating benches. The lawn has been shrunk down to make way for more flowers and laurel hedging divides the garden in half. For active son Jacob, Kathleen has designed a sunroom and if he wants to kick a ball against the wall – it will have to be through the water rill on the right. Blue colours adorn the walls & aim to give this garden a heavenly effect.