It’s june, and the garden is showing off a treat… foxgloves everywhere and a riot of colour. The Cottage Garden idea is a traditional one and started life 500 years or more ago, when the peasants who lived off the land and were given patches of ground behind and in front of their cottages. They combined vegetables for the table, herbs for culinary or medecianl use and some flowers for cutting. There would occasionally even be a pig to hoover up the scraps from the house! As the centuries progressed, the ideas changed and became more stylised, so that today we talk about the ‘cottage garden’ look. I am making a cottage garden behind our house in south Devon, and the resultant book will be published by Pimpernel Press next year. You can follow my progress on this instagram account, or just BUY THE BOOK in 2024!! thanks for looking, and happy gardening.