Student sows seeds at Chelsea Flower Show

UC student Kate Grace wins horticulture scholarship. Photo supplied

Vanessa Lam

27 June 2014: University of Canberra student rubbed shoulders with UK's horticultural royalty while helping sow the seeds for this year's Chelsea Flower Show.

The second year design/landscape architecture student Catherine Grace had the chance to meet some of her childhood heroes, UK's Allan Titchmarsh and Australian Graham Ross, while working in the garden of Perennial, a UK horticultural charity.

"I found it fascinating the way they treated every plant individually, and how they worked to get the colour, height, and texture combinations just right," she said.

Ms Grace is currently travelling around Europe to further explore the world of horticulture, after winning the 2013 BBM Sir John Pagan Horticulture Award.

The award, bestowed by the BBM Youth Support to young Australian horticulturists, includes an $8,000 travel scholarship to the UK to further their experience and training in the field.

"The BBM scholarship will help me gain knowledge from industry experts from around the world and give me incentive to further my prospects in the landscape architecture area that I am pursuing," Ms Grace said.

"I am excited to find out where this scholarship will take me in the future. I am excited that I get the opportunity to travel and learn from leading horticulturists and landscape architects and designers."

She would like to use the experience she gains from the three-month scholarship to help encourage high schoolers to make their schools greener.

"I would like to encourage high-school students to get motivated and excited about the landscape and environment that they live in. With the experience of the UK through the Big Brother Movement, along with the Australian Institute of Horticulture behind me I strongly believe that together we would be able to make this happen," she said.

UC design/landscape architecture student planting at the UK's Chelsea Flower Show. Photo supplied

Ms Grace, who already has a certificate three in horticulture and has started her own garden maintenance and design business, decided to start her degree at the University of Canberra when she realised that landscape architecture was the path for her.

"I was originally interested in wholesale and propagation, then I turned to the science of plants, but once I started to work with clients in their gardens, I realised that landscape architecture was the path I wanted to take," she said.

Once she began her degree at the University she soon realised that there was much to learn to further her career. 

"I started my degree and soon realised that there is so much to learn about design, and with some plant knowledge and the design and architecture knowledge I will gain from this experience, I think it will help my career immensely," she said.

Ms Grace explained that what she enjoyed most about horticulture and design is the way it can make a person feel. "I love the relationships that not only humans have with plants but also all creatures on the planet have with plants. I enjoy that a good landscape design can change a person's mood."

As part of her travels Ms Grace will be visiting several gardens across Europe. She will also meet with Swiss garden design, maintenance and construction company Grolimund Gartenbau AG; Annette Irish, the president of the Australian Institute of Horticulture in Germany; and University of Sheffield Professor James Hitchmough, who was one of the designers of the 2012 London Olympic Games. 

As well as taking part in the planting process of the Royal Horticultural Society Chelsea show gardens Ms Grace will do work experience at the Edinburgh Botanic Gardens in Scotland.

You can keep up to date with Ms Grace's European horticultural adventure via her blog.