Chelsea Fringe Festival
The Chelsea Fringe Festival is all about harnessing and spreading the excitement and energy that fizzes around gardens and gardening. The idea is to give people the freedom and opportunity to express themselves through the medium of plants and gardens, to open up possibilities and to allow full participation.
Entirely independent of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show (though acting with its support), the Fringe usually explodes out of the show-ground geographically, demographically and conceptually. Its events encompass everything from grassroots community garden projects to avant-garde art installations. Our open-access principle means that just about anything goes – as long as it’s interesting and legal, and on the subject of gardens, flowers, veg-growing or landscape.
The Walthamstow Wetlands
2019
For the Chelsea Fringe Festival 2019 we proposed a trio of sculptures inspired by the water cycle and the local flora of the Walthamstow Wetlands. These sculptures had a lifespan beyond the festival, remaining in place for the E17 Art Trail in June 2020.
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The Rain Cloud
A suspended sculpture, the shower of shimmering Lunaria (Honesty) seed heads fall like raindrops from a hollow cloud form, the precipitation part of the cycle, and source of water for the Wetlands and reservoirs alike.
The main body was constructed around the crossbeams from lightweight wire mesh and the seed heads were suspended using lightweight, galvanised wire, ensuring a long lifespan for the sculpture.
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Waterfall
A large willow branch (sourced from the Wetlands site) forms the base for this cascade of flowers, representing the flowing torrent of a waterfall. This is part of the collection stage of the water cycle but shows the challenge of containing water, which will travel and create its own path when there is enough of it. Cymbidium orchids was used as a nod to the native Bee Orchid growing onsite.
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The Cloud
A beautiful, suspended cloud of dried material representing the condensation part of the water cycle, where water vapour cools and turns back into a liquid. The cloud was using reeds harvested from the Wetlands, along with Honesty (Lunaria) and Gypsophila.
For The E17 Art Trail, we added bright coloured spray flowers to the sculpture, representing the optical phenomenon of cloud iridescence, reflecting the theme of 'Wonder'.
The Walthamstow Wetlands
2018
For our first project at Chelsea Fringe we designed and created a botanical sculpture trail in this 211 hectare site with an abundance of wildlife & industrial heritage to showcase the fascinating flora & fauna growing in not only Europe’s largest urban wetland but our local nature reserve.
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The Herons
We built 2 willow herons perching at 5ft tall over the wetlands canal and reservoir as the first artwork on the trail, close to The Engine House.
The willow was sourced from a local reserve as Willow trees are abundant at The Wetlands and are mostly to be found on the banks of water, needing high volumes of it to maintain their supple branches.
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Bulrushes
These planted reed beds support a huge variety of wildlife at the Walthamstow Wetlands, including many species of bird. We installed 15 giant fat balls appearing as if to grow amongst them, echoing the cylindrical flowers, providing food for the wildfire that gradually disappears.
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The Beeswax Tansies
Using besswax supplied by Local Honey Man we created a representation of this native flower using local golden beeswax. Hundreds of leaves were individually added to create the statuesque forms. These sculptures were loaned to garden designer Alex Ryan Mills for part of her 'Perfect for Polinators' garden at BBC Gardeners World Show later in the year, which won a Silver -gilt medal.
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Bee Orchids
Often hidden along the banks of the reservoirs, this native orchid actually self pollinates as it has evolved to be pollinated by a male bee found primarily in the Mediterranean area. We have recreated their elegant form in white clay to help them stand out within the wildflower meadow area.