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      The answer lies in the soil… The most important component in successful plant selection and subsequent plant establishment is an understanding of soil conditions. With this in mind the Masters students and I spent a happy time on a sunny winter’s morning in one of Writtle’s glasshouses (we do have a soils lab but we wanted to be in the sunshine after a rather intense few weeks work in the Studio) carrying out pH tests and soil texture analysis. These are a useful set of practical skills for landscape architects and garden designer as part of site analysis. We discovered that a colleague’s blueberry plants were in the wrong place on his allotment - but we also found a more appropriate place on the same site showing how variable conditions can be.   We couldn’t resist creating some very small environmental sculptures from our efforts at the end of the morning - after all we are designers! Festive Greeting to all our students and other blog readers… Dr Jill Ragg...

  Undergraduate landscape and garden design students explored the process and value of creating an ephemeral artwork on campus to share with the wider community of Writtle University College.   The multi-stemmed Betula utilis var. jacquemontii (Western Himalayan birch) were transformed with rings of Cornus sericea 'Flaviramea' (golden-twig dogwood) and a carpet of golden Ginkgo biloba foliage. Finally to brighten a winter’s evening and create an unexpected moment for people as they ended their day the students placed rings of candles around each tree and in one of the rings suspended in a tree’s branches.   This environmental art intervention follows in a long tradition of such events at Writtle University College which have been fostered over the years by the lecturers Steve Terry and Dr Jill Raggett. They have worked with their talented students and in a number of collaborations with professional artists, designers and architects. Read more about this work in their key...

If you’ve ever wondered why some of the Design team academics wander around campus in chemical warfare suits often turn up to lectures with swollen ankles it’s because they have taken up the art of Apiculture better known as Beekeeping. After a busy and productive year it is now the time to put the bees to bed for the winter. The year has been an exciting one for us, we started the year with two colonies and have ended it with three. Our two original colonies now have new queens which will, hopefully, see us through the next season. Our third colony is just getting established and will, with care, develop over the next year. This was our first full year with the bees and it’s been a steep learning curve. One of our hives was without a queen for a while meaning the colony developed a bit of an attitude, after more than a few stings and the occasional race to the safety of our cars they eventually settled down and rewarded us with a good crop of honey. We keep our bees at the campus Apia...

      On a bright and frosty November morning MA Landscape Architecture students visited a wholesale plant nursery that supplies a huge range of shrubs and trees to landscape and horticultural industries across the UK. Provender Nurseries in Kent gave their time to show us around and share with us an insight into what is involved in running a business in this key industry.     The nursery covers a 17 acre plot which we found enjoyable to wander around. As our tutor Jill Raggett observed, it is much like visiting an arboretum - all specimens are labelled - but in this case all the trees are a lot closer together. This makes for a perfect few educational hours! Some particular specimens that caught the attention of our group were the Prunus serrula (with its shining coppery bark); the striking drooping foliage of the Chamaecyparis nootkatensis ‘Pendula’; and the magnificent spreading Juniperus x pfitzeriana ‘Winter Gold’.   This nursery does not propagate...

Every year as part of the Reading the Landscape module first year students on the undergraduate courses in Landscape architecture and Landscape and Garden Design take cameras out into the campus grounds and try to capture the ephemeral or phenomenal elements that add to the landscape experience but often go un-noticed. This can include light, shadow, reflection, seasonal colour, cloud effects, water droplets in fact anything that is temporary and fleeting. Students have captured some amazing visual images over the years and this year is no exception. The academic team have chosen their favourites from this year’s excellent submissions, the seven considered the best are as follows. Richard Romang, Lecturer in Landscape Architecture at WUC