Help preserve our future
West Dean is part of a registered charity and relies on the support of generous donors, friends, legacies to help us deliver world-class education in conservation and the creative arts and maintain our award-winning gardens.
Val Bourne
Val Bourne is an award-winning garden writer, organic gardener and lecturer and she gardens on the wind-swept Cotswolds at Spring Cottage - high above Bourton-on-the-Water in Gloucestershire. Her third of an acre garden is managed without using chemicals - something Val has always believed in. She is a hands on gardener and a committed plantaholic.
The Ten Minute Gardener's Fruit Growing Diary; The Living Jigsaw: the secret life in your garden; The Ten Minute Gardener's Vegetable Growing Diary; Colour in the Garden; The Winter Garden; The Natural Gardener; Seeds of Wisdom;
I've been a gardener all my life, but I only began writing about gardening in 1995. Back then most garden writing seemed uninspiring, rather dull and often badly informed. So I put my toe in the water, having been inspired by Beth Chatto's nursery catalogue which described plants with incredible flair and poetry. It wasn't easy and I earnt £50 in my first six months. I moth balled my car, took to a bike, and lived on a diet of cheap baked beans. Gradually I crept into the world of garden writing and I've kept going.