MIFGS 2018 was by far our biggest undertaking at the show. In our previous 4 builds, we’d only ever built gardens, either designed by us or others, in a 5x5m area. In 2018, we were invited by three separate companies to assist them with their builds. One of which was a 5x5m Boutique Garden for Octopus Garden Design. One was for Phillip Withers Landscape Design, who had been invited to build the first ever “Welcome Garden” by the organisers of the show. Phil was selected for this due to winning Best In Show the previous year. This garden was split into three zones, two being around 4x4m and one closer to 6x6m. The third garden was for a collaborative design between Ross Uebergang and Yosuke Yamaguchi (an internationally acclaimed designer from Japan) which was 17x10m.
We had one of our team leading the construction on Octopus Garden Design’s Boutique Garden with another helping on about half of the days and this Garden was awarded a Gold Medal for the category. It was an incredibly impressive and unique design which celebrated the ageing of gardens, with three oversized copper planters being a feature of the design.
We had one of our team assisting with the construction and management of Phillip Withers Welcome Garden along with representatives of three other construction companies. This garden wasn’t eligible to win any awards.
On the Ross Uebergang/Yosuke Yamaguchi garden, we had 2-4 or our team working on and coordinating the construction throughout the build, as well as having Dale from D.Vine Scapes and Tim from Space Capsule Garden Co, among an army of volunteers who Ross and Yosuke had organised. This garden was a polarising one. It was a blend of Japanese design principles mixed with the Grampians/Australian bush. The feedback from the general public wasn’t quite as positive as that from almost every Landscape Designer who saw it, stating that it was their favourite. Unfortunately, due to a number of factors which included us biting off more than we could chew resulting in it not being 100% complete, this garden didn’t win any awards.
