The annual Bloom horticultural festival returns to the Phoenix Park on the first weekend of June with 22 small, medium and large show and feature gardens. A stand-out theme this year is the focus on spaces for young people, including ‘The Know, Act, Prevent Garden’ by the National Poisons Information Centre (NPIC) at Beaumont Hospital.
The impact of climate change and making better use of the outdoors feature as recurring themes in the show gardens with the NDC’s ‘Embracing the Elements’, Power of One alternative urban front garden by Citroën and the Greening our Cities garden. Other spaces host reclaimed and upcycled materials which later become permanent gardens elsewhere.
Gardiners will find inspiration in the ever-popular ‘Postcard Gardens’, which include nine small but perfectly formed pop-up gardens that are designed and built by community groups, schools and training organisations across Ireland. There will also be five days of gardening talks, a village of nurseries, floral displays and a botanical art exhibition.
Laura Douglas, who heads up Bloom at Bord Bia, said there will be live cookery demonstrations from some of Ireland’s top chefs, including Neven Maguire, Catherine Fulvio, Rory O’Connell, Fiona Uyema, JP McMahon, Edward Hayden, Brian McDermott and Shane Smith. The Quality Kitchen stage will host interviews with more than 40 Irish food producers.
Photo: Musician Kylabelle McKinney at the launch of this summer’s Bloom festival
