Plants are all around us in urban areas, we just have to look. London for example is teeming with plants; with wild species, curated spaces full of cultivated ones, and artistic representations all present. Take a stroll down New Bond Street right now, all the high-end designers are pushing botanics like mad. This weekend on a walk …
Very large lit-up conifer trees have appeared across the city for our enjoyment – we should celebrate them as they have given their lives for us. In addition, there are many other interpretive botanical works to be seen in London. We bring it all together in one map. Take the walking route suggested and in …
The variety of plant life, along with hiking trails and sunshine, is one reason enough to visit La Palma in the Canary Islands. To start with there is the abundance of bananas, with the island home to many banana farmers. You see them growing everywhere. For some, this is a travesty, a dominating monoculture that …
Artist Rosemary Stephens often walks on Wanstead Flats twice a day, is a volunteer litter picker, wildlife protector, general nature lover and wonderful image maker; capturing the magic of early mornings in the area before posting them, for anyone to enjoy, to her Twitter stream, The Nature Of The Flats. What is clear from her offerings is just how …
Columbia Road Flower Market and its environs is quite the spectacle; this is obvious from the sheer number of photographers hovering at every stall. What also gives it away is the pale-pink-suited male model strolling past holding a large bunch of deep pink velvety dahlias, or the tweed wearing, moustached 20 year old art student …
Walking through the National Gallery in London is one of life’s great free pleasures. If you live in London that is. While there, what you tend to overhear most are people proclaiming, “now this one, is REALLY famous”. The truth is, they kind of all are, but some rooms definitely impress more. Room 45 is …
Visiting three National Trust properties in one day is not necessarily something to aspire to, but if you have the legs for it, start early enough, and have membership, then why not. At the end of it you are able to say “my favourite was x”, or “x had the best border”, “y the grandest …
Plant Curator is working on the plant art aficionado’s ultimate UK road-trip. High up on the list of stop-off points is a small area of southern Kentish coast. Dungeness is a strangely beautiful, postmodern place. Wild and windswept, this isolated seascape inhabited by hundreds of plants and some pleasingly minimalist buildings, is made all the …
Hornby Island is located off the eastern shore of central Vancouver Island, just east of Denman Island. Depending on how well you catch your connections it will take you 5 or 6 hours and three ferry rides to get there from Vancouver. Once there you can drive all the way around in about 20 minutes. What …
Has anybody noticed the way vine plants are creeping into the design of the Beatty Street Mural in Vancouver? It is as if they seem to know exactly where to go and how to perfectly accentuate the look of each individual rendered. An eye-patch to David Suzuki, a goatee for Terry Fox, a bit more …