A Clare contestant pushing the benefits of gardening for mental and physical wellbeing will feature in a brand new RTÉ show this week.
Ireland’s Garden Heroes, which will premiere on RTÉ One on Thursday at 8pm, has captured the imagination of ordinary people across the island and how this translates into what for many people like Clare contestant, Carl Wright, can be defined as a “life’s work.”
With a vested interest in restoring old houses and buildings, Carl quickly realised that he was afforded a unique opportunity to combine his background in ecology with his building skills and a newfound love for plants.
“I found that I was interested in garden design and buildings. The garden quickly grew bigger and bigger. It’s now almost two acres. It’s a woodland garden with a series of separate interconnected rooms. It has everything in it from a pond to a river, woodland garden, wildflower meadows and lots of rocks. It’s very unusual,” the Caher Bridge Garden Centre owner stated.
Pushed by friends and visitors to put in for the RTÉ show, Carl is looking forward to seeing what the three experts Horticulturist Jimi Blake, Garden Designer Niall Maxwell and Landscape Designer Ingrid Swan make of the “monster” that is his “entire life all through the seasons.” The gardens will be split into different categories in each episode, and the experts will assess the plants, the design, the functionality, and the feel of the garden before ultimately choosing a winner. Each episode will have an individual winner, and they will become one of Ireland’s Garden Heroes.