L/R The original William Turner Garden, Zoe Bottrell checking over Morpeth Borough Council's Show Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show, Show Garden in bloom
In 2004, just before Culture Creative was launched, Zoe Bottrell, Founder and Managing Director, was working for Morpeth Borough Council and based in Northumberland. That year the council, still riding high from the praise they had garnered for their new William Turner herb garden that had recently opened in Morpeth’s Carlisle Park, took a bold new step and entered the RHS Chelsea Flower Show as one of 22 showcase gardens.
The idea was to recreate a version of the new William Turner herb garden in a 30ft by 25ft space. So, under the watchful management of Zoe, replica gazebos, trellises, a garden seat, and even stone obelisks were trucked off down to Chelsea in London to be part of the team’s entry, at what is still the world’s most prestigious gardening event of the year.
The replica William Turner Garden, like the original, was filled with medicinal plants set out in beds according to the areas of the body they were used to treat. The garden drew in the crowds throughout the event and was honoured with a Bronze Medal.
Turner was born in Morpeth in 1508 and is celebrated for having written and recorded in English, the names and medicinal uses of plants in his three-part book 'Herbal' – the first botanical work in English, which earned him a reputation as the Father of English Botany.
The 2004 Chelsea Flower Show was Zoe’s first dabble into the world of horticulture and rubbing shoulders with some leading garden designers and plant specialists from across the world. Looking back, it is perhaps also one of the reasons the company still works predominately outdoors, entrusted to create stunning light trails in many of the world’s leading botanical gardens.
Read more about the Carlisle Park and William Turner Garden here.
