Thank you for visiting the webpages of Norfolk Plant Heritage. For speedy direct access, you may find it helpful to bookmark this page or save it as a favourite.
It is simple to move around the pages: click the coloured words such as Group Events or Group Contacts or the appropriate headings on the left or right of this page. Please note that information about our Plant Fairs now comes at the end of the Events list. Group News contains just what it says; have a look.
A quick update next
Our AGM in November 2011 drew 60 members and the keynote talk by Adrian Bloom was clearly the main attraction: the scion of an iconic gardening family, a distinguished horticulturalist with a famous garden 'Foggy Bottom', Adrian is also recipient of the RHS Victoria Medal of Honour. In addition Bressingham Gardens holds the National Collection of Miscanthus cultivars.
His title 'Less is More' offered a hint of the likely content: anyone who had already read Adrian's recent work - 'Blooms Best Perennials and Grasses' might well have anticipated his well developed thesis that we should focus on fewer but tried and tested plants. We listened with rapt attention to his account of his journey as a plants person and garden maker and his top ten plants for all seasons. What no one expected was his final flourish in which Adrian applied the 'less is more' dictum to the National Plant Collections.
It was evident that Adrian had struck a chord that resonated around the hall. Over recent months one or two committee members had expressed similar thoughts about the role of Plant Heritage. None had, however, developed such a well structured argument challenging the current system on which National Plant Collections are based. Because this subject merits further dissemination and discussion we felt it important to make Adrian's proposals available to a wider audience on our website and will be forwarding his text to our National Committee. We would value your response.
Read on!
The Group Events pages are currently being updated to give the details of the programme for January 2012 - March 2012. Details of the group trip to Kent in September 2012 can be downloaded.
The autumn 2011 issue of our local journal Borderline has events for the following 6 months, to March 2012 in it detailed by our Programme Secretary, Kathy Gray. There is a wide range of articles and it also contains group news
Please always confirm the plans in the Group Events listings as sometimes things have to change.
There is also an article about our outstanding study day on hollies in November 2010 on these webpages. To reach it, click Group News in the list to the left. A box will open under that heading. Click that and you will be taken to the article, which is by Kathy Gray, our Programme Secretary.
A bit about our Group now
The Group was founded in 1989 by Miss Jan Paulger, now our President. In November 2008, we changed our name to Norfolk Plant Heritage. The national organisation had then just re-named itself Plant Heritage rather than National Council for the Conservation of Plants and Gardens.
Norfolk Plant Heritage is a lively, friendly and welcoming group with more than 140 members. By joining the national organisation, you will automatically become a member of our Group without extra payment. The aims of Plant Heritage are reflected in our Group's interest in a wide range of garden plants, their cultivation and their conservation.
We are proud to support the Holders of the National Collections in the County. Click on Group Collections to learn more. The former Elaeagnus Collection is being re-estabished in a dedicated site at Blickling Hall, a more imposing - and a more visited - location than Brundall Cemetery! Once re-instated, it will, we hope, become a Collection again.
Although National Collections are central to the organisation, our Group is far from having an exclusive focus on them. We arrange a varied and interesting programme of lectures, practical demonstrations, social events and garden visits, as well as two excellent Plant Fairs each year which are attended by nurseries from Norfolk and elsewhere. We have one of the biggest programmes of events of any Group, and 2012 sees an astonishing 18 events so far. Do come along!
Non-members are welcome to join us at any of our events for a small additional charge. Members can bring a friend free to any of our regular winter talks or regular garden visits - there is more on this in Group News.
Members are also entitled to attend events of other Groups (and vice-versa, of course), so you may like to consult their pages by clicking on Find a local group in the box on the right and then on the relevant Groups in the list which appears.
Twice a year, members of Norfolk Plant Heritage receive our local journal, Borderline, and Plant Heritage, the national magazine. Nick Broughton, the new Editor of Borderline, is bringing fresh thinking to its strategy and content, with more space devoted to articles about plants. There are more photographs too and competitions with prizes.
Norfolk Plant Heritage webpages last updated on 23rd November 2011
Masthead photograph of Dr. Janet Sleep's garden by Nick Broughton 2009