October in Scotland

We were very much in need of leaving the house. I did get to travel (and photograph wonderful gardens with the most wonderful people and I can’t wait to be able to tell you more about this) but S. has been working from home (which is great too, of course) but well, we just needed to be away a bit. And so we went to Scotland to catch the beautiful, golden October there. I was craving for the wilderness, cool and rainy days, muted colours and that quiet and calm I very often find there.

We stayed in a self catering accomodation only twenty minutes from Edinburgh but really out in the middle of nowhere. This suited us and the current situation perfectly. We went for quiet walks, up the Lammermuir hills but also to the sea a couple of times. It felt so good being somewhere this tranquil.

We stayed on a farm in a wee bothy. Backing our garden there, there was a walled garden and an old abandoned building that captured me the first time I saw it. It looked derelict and I sooo wanted to see what was behind the walls of the garden. One morning I took a photo of the house, shared it on Instagram and tadaam, not long after that, the owner of that house messaged me. But what are the chances??! Someone who follows me must have recognized the house and let her know? No idea. But long story short, she let me go over and have a look around. I was so excited to (officially) trespass and see the house and the grounds from close! It’s been lying empty for years and the new owners have now started the works and I cannot wait to see the changes next time we’re up.

So above is the house as I first saw it from behind the fence and then from a bit closer. I took many more images of it but I also want to respect its privacy. Oh and the garden is full of beautiful holly bushes and mostly lived in by sheep and that’s about it at the moment but I’m sure it will see some wonderful changes.

So yes, I was looking for peace and quiet. Crisp and grey. Muted colours and wilderness. I needed headspace and to be able to think without sitting in front of a screen. What is a bit unknown of a Winter and a new year just round the corner, these few days away were so important to me, to see clear and to make plans. All this - and more - happened in Scotland. I had two shoots that I’ll tell you about soon. Until then, enjoy October wherever you are. This is by far my favourite month, for all the reasons I mentioned above, so I’m just happy being here.

Woodland foxgloves

Come on Eva, I show you my secret foxglove walk, said Stanley. So off we went, for a beautiful evening woodland walk. The woods were alive with wildlife yet still very peaceful. Thank you Justine and Stan for the walk, I cannot wait to return to these woods in Autumn too..

April in the garden - ii

So our garden is not particularly big and it’s not particularly exciting for many, I’m aware of that. This garden has seen someone coming here and saying to me, I don’t like your gardening style. Oh well, that’s absolutely fine, of course. We’re renting here so there’s only so much you can (and want) to do to this garden but our landlords are the best and let us do anything we like. This garden had been neglected for a long time before we moved in six years ago but then as we slowly started to work on it (and with it), we discovered so many wonderful cottage garden plants and many traces from a garden that it once was. The garden is quite long and not too wide. When we came, I started to dig up a border on the sunny side, there was a lot of fight with ivy and ground elder but that long bed is now absolutely managable. Many parts of the garden are still ruled by the aforementioned plants.

April has been blue, forget-me-nots all over the garden. I love the cottagegardenness of this garden. Geraniums everywhere and the aquilegia has started to flower too. The tulips are slowly gone but my peasant eye narcissus has just started to flower, I forgot to photograph that but I’ll add it next time. With Salomon’s seal. And cow parsley.

But until then, these are the things I’ve recently captured in the garden.

April in the garden - i

I’ll be sharing with you little details from my garden here as long as I can. I finally have time to really observe every tiny bit of the garden through my lens. I hope you enjoy it.

English cottage garden

English cottage garden

Forget me nots growing under old garden bench

English cottage garden

Yellow tulips and forget-me-nots

No Floral Foam Class at Middleton Lodge

It has been a while and although I do really like blogs and I definitely want to keep this one going, time just always gets in the way. But now! I’m planning to get back to sharing lots of images with you, mostly thanks to all your kind words about how my photos lift you up.

Today I’d like to share some - oh it was so hard to choose - photos form a wonderful workshop I photographed at the beginning of March. Middleton Lodge has gone floral foam free and together with the wonderful floral designers Simply By Arrangement and The Wilde they decided to run a class about the techniques and mechanics to create a breathtaking wedding scene without the use of floral foam. I met and photographed the work some amazing florists there and well, taking these images was a dream. A treat, in fact.

What I haven’t done before and it was a first for me, shooting a model! I was so nervous and excited at the same time before the shoot. Luckily, Steph was a professional model and she new exactly what to do. As you’ll see.

Cove Harbour - Scotland

The moment Storm Dennis arrived in Scotland, I stopped at the wee parking in Cove and went for a walk after a long drive up from England.

2019 January - June

JULY

July was a very busy month. I photographed some stunning gardens from the Cotswolds to the Kent coast, you’ll see them this year. However, one of those has already been published - that of Matthew Rice at Ham Court - you can see this beautiful place in the Plant Issue of Gardens Illustrated.

July saw the publication of one of my favourite gardens. This was a commission by House&Garden and I spent a few days in Cheshire. The hottest Summer days, in fact. The garden was designed by Chris Moss.

Summer also meant Summer evening parties, and there was a wonderfully magical one and that I photographed for Mercurial Moon.

One of my favourite shoots in July was with my dear friend Justine in her studio.

AUGUST

August continued to be a busy month with more travels to Yorkshire. And as I mentioned earlier, this was the month the article of Debbie George and Andrew Sanderson’s house was published in Homes&Antiques.

London gardens again, here’s one designed by Emily Erlam

and one by Non Morris

In August I had a fun shoot at the Big Festival in the Cotswolds, for Country Living.

And a different Food Festival at Soho Farmhouse. Special guest, Tomos Parry

SEPTEMBER

September looked like this..

With Julie Reilly in Country Living.

Several visits to Chastleton House. This house is very close to Daylesford farm where I held 4 classes.

and the rest, well, that is to be revealed later next year!

OCTOBER

In October, we finally! went on a wee holiday to Scotland. But even holidays cannot be complete without garden visits, so we went to Cambo (oh the dream!) and Broadwoodside. Both were stunning. Scottish gardens are just magical.

In October I went back to Middleton Lodge but this time to photograph at the Knackered Florists retreat. For me it was a definite treat. I sometimes still find it hard to believe that this is actually my job and I’m having the best of time while I work.

In October, I had a video one-to-one with the moooost wonderful person and teacher and photographer, Sarah Mason. I cannot upload the video I made with the help of Sarah here but you can find it on my Instagram. This was the most inspiring day.

And in October was published another Chris Moss garden I shot last Autumn. It appeared in Gardens Illustrated.

NOVEMBER

November was the month when I had my most one-to-ones, they were suprisingly more about editing images rather than taking them. I loved ever single one of these.

There were also bonfires and fireworks.

and a Dog Modelling class with Honeysuckle and Hilda and Darlingdog .

and I started to get in the festive spirit..

There were more gardens in November too.

DECEMBER

December was about wreaths. And more wreaths. And drinks.

One at Soho House, I didn’t make one here.

I did make one here, this was with Swallows and Damsons, read about it here.

I met Santa ..

And I have a few shoots for local businesses like the Coaching Barn

December also brought some quiet time at home and one final shoot in Yorkshire between Christmas and New Year.

So this just a fraction of what 2019 brought for me and to give you an idea of the work I do as in the busy days, I so rarely get the chance to share anything with you.

I have some very interesting projects lined up for 2020 and I can’t wait to get back to work. I still find it hard to call it work as I just love so much what I do. I am very generous and thankful for everyone who commissioned me and trusted me to photograph their garden, their events or their small businesses.
Happy New Year!

2019 January - June

Looking back on the year is one of my favourite things to do during the quiet days between Christmas and New Year. My 2019 was an amazing year and I cannot but only be grateful for the wonderful people I met, the dream commissions I got and all the beautiful places I travelled to.
When I look back on the year, I usually do it by looking at all the photos I took. Well, not all of them but you see what I mean. I cannot (yet) share everything with you (especially of two big assignments, one in Somerset and one in Yorkshire and that took me a whole year to complete) but I’ve chosen a selection of images that I hope will give you a good representation of the work I do.

I love telling stories with my photography and no matter what I shoot, gardens or stories in the countryside, I always try to stay true to my style. And my heart.

JANUARY

I started the year with a trip up to my beloved Yorkshire. I photographed Debbie George’s beautiful house for a feature in Home&Antiques (I’ll share more about this in the August part) It was the perfect start to the year. I love Yorkshire and little did I know in January that I would go back there many more times in 2019.

January also saw the publication of these images in Country Living and that I took of Bea Andrews of Botanikafloral.

I often shoot for Soho House so the first shoot of the year for them was the soft opening of their brand new diner, Mollie’s Diner in Oxfordshire. This was just a few minutes before the diner was so busy I could hardly move. And the story came out beautifully.

FEBRUARY

February was dark and exciting. I shot a private dinner party in Mayfair. I always like a challenge and shooting in such dark conditions was definitely one.

The first travel abroad was to Belgium with Clare Foster. It started in Kalmthout and then off we went to Bruges to discover some beautiful gardens of Piet Blanckaert. You can see one of these gardens in the January issue of House & Garden. And look out for the February issue for images of witch hazel from Kalmthout.

February brought some flowers and I shot something different, some vegan beauty products for Country Living.

MARCH

Happy day when this garden designed by Arne Maynard and that I shot last year, was published in House&Garden in March. And le voilà

In March I was in the middle of photographing our local artists for Art Weeks and this took up a lot of my time but I thoroughly enjoyed it. And I’m doing it again, with the new artists joining in. So yes, this was most of March and continued into

APRIL

I photographed over 40 artists as part of our Art Weeks (Watlington, Oxfordshire), here’s just a modest selection of the photos from those shoots.

Spring came and with that some stunning bouquets by Honeysuckle and Hilda. I had a lot of shoots this year with Clare, most of them at Daylesford Farm (where I was teaching too but so typical, I never had the change to take any images of my classes)

And there was a chilled event with Rick Stein in Chiswick.

In April, my 1-2-1 teaching season opened too. I travelled up to Shropshire to teach Tammy at Wild Bunch Flowers and then to Cheshire for another one-to-one with Carol Siddorn from Carol’s Garden. I will not be able to mention everyone here I would like to say a very big thank you to everyone who came either to my home or booked one of my classes at Daylesford Farm. I absolutely love teaching and I really enjoy passing on the love of photography to anyone who’s inspired..

MAY

May was beautiful. I travelled back to Belgium to photograph those gardens of Piet Blanckaert that I mentioned back in February.

and then came a wonderful trip to the South of France (more on this later but I can tell you that an absolutely stunning garden was involved)

I spent quite a lot of time in London too. There was the Chelsea Flower show

and I also shot an event at the studio of the very inspirational couple, Annie Morris and Idris Kahn.

Another article I shot was published in the May issue of Country Living.

I spent a whole week in beautiful Derbyshire to shoot a story for Country Living. Again, this will come out in May so I’ll tell you more about it then.

JUNE

Summer arrived and with it, lots of parties. I do love recording parties in meadows like this 40th birthday party here in an Oxfordshire village.

and there was another party related BBQ learning event at Soho Farmouse

and a lovely lunch hosted by Emma Harris aka @aquietstyle.

June brought my first ever front cover of Gardens Illustrated from this feature of the magical walled garden at Middleton Lodge, designed by Tom Stuart-Smith.

I continued travelling down to Somerset and on my way home from those shoots, I always stopped discovering new gardens and country houses. Like Great Chalfield Manor. I can never tire of seeing new gardens and of the English countryside.

Then there was the wonderful Strawberry Hill Flower Festival where I had the change to photograph the stunning work of so many creative florists. Here’s just one work chosen for you of Botanical Tales and Atlas Flowers.

to be continued with the rest of the year!