Serge Hill – Plant Library Days

Information on our exciting new planting design course at The Plant Library, Serge Hill.

Dates for the course:

Workshop 1 - 14th May 2025

Workshop 2 – 16th July 2025

Workshop 3 – 24th September 2025

Please note that it is essential to attend each day – they cannot be purchased individually. £720

This course is comprised of three individual study days, spread over the seasons. Participants spend time in Tom Stuart-Smith's Plant Library comprising over 1500 perennials and bulbs, at the Serge Hill Project in order to research and create a personal, plant combinations portfolio, finishing the course with an invaluable resource for future projects. 

Participants will be given four different sites at Serge Hill to create planting plans, using plants from TPL. Project work would include researching the conditions for each of these sites and creating a planting plan for each one, presented in their portfolio.

Each day will begin with a lecture – session 1 and 3 this will be with Tom Stuart-Smith and session 2 with Noel Kingsbury. Then there will be a walk and talk with Head Gardener Mille Souter and Landscape Architect Mattis Köpe.

The afternoon will be workshop time where participants can work on their planting portfolio with help and advice from Millie, Mattis and Annie.

The planting portfolio brief:

We are asking each participant to produce a planting plan at a scale of 1:50 for the four different areas selected from Serge Hill – the plans should contain perennials and bulbs from TPL – the larger gardens will provide inspiration for the trees and shrubs.

The plans can be drawn by hand or done in CAD.

There should be an illustration accompanying each plan – in the form of an elevation or perspective sketch.

The file should include a table of the plants with essential reference information on each plant.

Between session 2 and 3 there will be an online Q&A session with Noel Kingsbury where you can ask questions and check plant choices.