Designing, building, planting, and photographing an island
The wildlife pond project reimagined a derelict boating pond as a green centre piece to public gardens in Weston-super-Mare. It was an ambitious project working through the Friends of Prince Consort Gardens, a group I have been involved with for over ten years.
The process of design was informed by a photographic methodology, studying archival photographs, considering viewpoints, local materials, features, and recreating an island bigger and better from the 1900s. The design responded to the Victorian heritage of the location and blended that with the idea of wildness through the planting - exotic and native. The project started in July 2017, was funded by public donations and grants, and formally opened in December 2018.
Photographing is ongoing. It includes colour film, mixing flash, daylight, colour shifts and visual references from early postcards and graphic printing processes. Some of this material was put together for a talk I gave at Weston Museum titled ‘Gardening in Public: 10 years of Friends of Prince Consort Gardens’ in 2022.
