Open Garden Squares Weekend? Yes, please!

There will be no rest for the weary (though jubilant) this week! Although the Queen's Diamond Jubilee festivities officially end today, whence the many party and parade goers will be miserably back at work nursing headaches and hangovers, this garden history student's diary is packed full of wonderful events continuing through the end of the week.

Tomorrow, 6 June, there is a meeting of the London Historians in a pub near Westminster Abbey (and doesn't that just call to mind the Inklings meeting at the pub in Oxford? England is fantastic that way). This group is new to me and isn't focused on garden history, per se, but is a meeting of amateur and professional historians who love, well, history of all kinds and possess a fondness for this amazing city we live in and all the stories it has to tell.

On Friday 8 June there is a seminar at the Institute for Historical Research titled 'Gardens of Marrakesh: Back to the Future'. The garden history seminars are always interesting, informative - and free! - and the group is invited to dine together afterward.

The the pièce de résistance - London's Open Garden Squares Weekend - is this weekend 9 and 10 June, all day both days. This event also signals the end of this year's first annual Chelsea Fringe festival and what a wonderful way to draw the curtain on such an eventful spring. I'm looking forward to seeing as many gardens as I can, some that are completely new and unknown to me, plus the special events: How can I pass up World Wide Knit in Public Day!? I just might get some help on that sock that's been languishing unfinished in my bag.

If you're in London and still riding the tide of Jubilee adrenaline, you might want to check some of these out. And my fingers are crossed that the weekend is a bit less wet than the past few days.

London Garden History Walk

OK, I'm a little late since the Chelsea Flower Show ended on Saturday, but it's never too late to get a copy of Tom (my tutor) Turner's London Gardens Walk. It's an eBook containing a map with a 30km walk, cycle, or ride route to places in London which illustrate different eras and styles of garden history. It was published to coincide with this year's first annual Chelsea Fringe festival, which is still going even though the flower show is over.

The printable .pdf route map includes sites of the Fringe festivities so if you're in London for Chelsea or the Jubilee (I'm getting a wee bit excited about that, aren't you!?), there's still time to catch these events.

For more info on both the London Gardens Walk and Chelsea Fringe 2012, check out these websites:
www.gardevisit.com and www.chelseafringe.com