In association with Gardeners World magazine, we are running this one off course which is a basic introduction to River Cottage gardening. The day will be led by Mark Diacono, our Head Gardener, and hosted by Kevin Smith, Commissioning Editor of Gardeners World magazine. Below is a brief description of how this fantastic day will unfold. (Click above to find ticket availability)

Everyone can grow even a little of their own food. Even if you live in the heart of the city, you don’t have to just dream of the good life, you can create your own edible area, and it can stay productive right through the year.

During the day, we’ll look at different approaches to choosing what to grow and help you draw up a wishlist of delicious food that suits the opportunities and constraints of your garden and your life, paying particular attention to the often-ignored colder months.

You’ll need to understand the fundamentals of growing your own, so we’ll look at the basics that are behind successful growing on any scale – including different methods of sowing and planting, watering and feeding, pest control, and the principles of rotation and succession. We’ll show you how to take advantage of the smallest spaces, maximise vertical opportunities, tailor your food wishlist to suit your situation, and techniques for ensuring that you pull in a healthy haul through the colder months as well as the heat of high harvest time. 

We’ll look at the different ways you can grow your own. You’ll learn how to create raised beds, about growing in pots, hanging baskets, on window sills, taking advantage of existing structures, the possibilities of ‘3D growing’ using edible climbers, and interplanting, looking at the pros and cons of each. 

The River Cottage Kitchen Team will then serve a delicious seasonal lunch using ingredients from the Kitchen Garden.

The day will include a tour of River Cottage HQ, including the Kitchen Garden and the courtyard area, to see how we’ve taken advantage of comparatively small spaces to grow a whole range of fruit, veg and herbs using the different methods discussed in the morning. We’ll also consider some opportunities that climate change has made possible - your wishlist options maybe wider than you thought. The River Cottage Garden Team will be on hand to answer any questions you have about establishing and maintaining any of the growing areas we visit.  

The productivity of your veg patch can be greatly improved with careful attention to a few details, and the final session focuses on getting the most from your plot, especially through the Winter. This will include the importance of selecting the right varieties, maximising your growing season, ensuring continual harvests, and sourcing what you need.

So, whether you want a year-round harvest from a garden, a balcony, a courtyard or an allotment, this course is for you.