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MARK SAUNDERS, HEAD GARDENER, FITTLEWORTH HOUSE
The gardens surrounding Georgian Fittleworth House in West Sussex cover 1 .2ha and feature a magnificent cedar tree, swathes of rhododendrons and mixed borders. There is also a rose garden and a formal fountain garden. But the pièce de résistance is the walled kitchen garden where vegetables, fruit and flowers for cutting are grown. White posts painted with neat black lettering label the straight rows of vegetables. Grape vines are strung on taut wires the length of the garden and three exotic bantam chickens peck at seeds and worms in the soil to complete the idyllic image.
Every morning head gardener Mark Saunders strolls from his tenanted cottage through a wooden gate to his office - a 1 9th-century potting shed.
On the day he talks to HW, he shows a group from the recently formed Friends of the National Garden scheme how to grow vegetables. He uses Fittleworth's 0.4ha walled kitchen garden, which is meticulously tended by him and assistant gardener Alex Miller, to hold a handson workshop in kitchen gardening.
The group is a mixture of enthusiastic amateurs, more experienced gardeners who open their own gardens for the scheme, and even a local estate owner and her estate manager looking for tips on how to start their own kitchen garden. Saunders' overall message is to be very organised at all stages. He shows them the novel gadgets and shortcuts he has developed over the past 1 0 years, growing vegetables and...