What is the Reckless Gardener and why did we create this web site?

The Reckless Gardener is an online gardening magazine for the not too serious gardener! It's aim is to provide a light hearted starting point to gardening, to provide basic help and advice, while generating design ideas and inspiration.

Emma Felton - Web Designer/Editor

On completing a postgraduate qualification in Newspaper Journalism, Emma was drawn to the developing technology of the world wide web. "It provides a great creative platform to produce a gardening magazine, on a global scale", says Emma, who has spent the last 11 years working in e-media, including 5 years as web coordination at the Faculty of Medicine, at Liverpool University.

"A few years ago I bought my first house, which included a small garden. Although I had pottered around my mum's garden, I didn't really have a clue how to look after mine! One spring afternoon, as I attempted to garden, slurping a large glass of red wine and listening to the football on the radio, (now over the age of 18!) I thought I can't be alone with this problem. And so Reckless Gardener was created.

Reckless is an online web site aimed at breaking down the preconceptions of gardening. You can check out the latest gardening, show and event news, take creative ideas from our Flickr photo gallery or watch one of our many gardening video's for inspiration/advice.

(When Emma is not on the internet, she's a massive cycling fan. Meeting Victoria Pendleton at RHS Chelsea Flower Show last year, was fantastic. ps, "I didn't earn that gold medal, but it was great to have it around my neck for a few minutes!")

Sandy Felton - Freelance Journalist & Features Editor

Sandy Felton is our features editor and the other half of the partnership at Reckless Gardener. She has been a journalist for over 30 years and was formerly the head of a large journalism department training post-graduates for a career in print, magazine and broadcast journalism.

Despite a long career in journalism it was only when Sandy retired that the opportunity for writing about gardening became a reality.  Now she can indulge in her passion of gardening, garden writing and visiting some of the UK's and Europe's premier gardens: "Having trained hundreds of journalists it was good to be able to 'get back to basics' and actually practice what I had preached all those years with a subject that was both enjoyable and a pleasure to write about," she explains.

Her passion for gardening goes back to her childhood when she first started her own garden at the age of 10: "Gardening for me has always been a great recreation," she explains. "After a hectic and busy day nothing is better for calming you down than spending an hour in the garden. The excitement of spring, the busy summer months with so much to do, the lazy autumn and then the changes of winter, all add to the never-ending heart-beat of your own little piece of ground."

Very much a cottage gardener she admits to being inspired by Gertrude Jekyll and that her favourite garden designer is Thomas Mawson. She is also a devotee of the late great Christopher Lloyd.

With a career in print journalism, working on the web has been a new challenge and Sandy has enjoyed teaming up with daughter Emma to create Reckless Gardener: "In the last six years we have met some lovely people and we never cease to be amazed at the versatility of the UK gardening scene."

In one of his articles, the American garden writer Henry Mitchell wrote: "As long as there are plants at all and as long as the gardener is human and as long as the garden is an important part of the gardener's leisure, there will be a bond or a spirit between all gardens of whatever type." Discovering that bond is a great adventure and one which Sandy hopes to discover for Reckless Gardener.

We hope you like our web site, if you have any comments, please don't hesitate to contact us - email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it