THE FEMININE TOUCH?
Gardens Illustrated|September 2024
Does your garden have masculine or feminine style, and does it even matter? Head gardener Benjamin Pope unpicks gardening's gender stereotypes
Benjamin Pope
THE FEMININE TOUCH?

Back in the spring of 2009, I had the pleasure of meeting Beverly McConnell, a formidable Antipodean plantswoman, internationally known for her garden Ayrlies in New Zealand. While showing her around the garden where I work, she remarked on the bountiful May display: “I hope you don’t mind me saying, but this garden feels very feminine.”

I smiled and replied that I didn’t mind, but I was slightly taken aback. As we carried on the tour, I quizzed her gently on what she meant by ‘feminine’, but it was only as the weeks passed that I wondered about the first part of her comment. As a man in my late twenties, should I have been offended that my work had been described as feminine?

Throughout history, the stereotypical gender roles that have existed within industry and society have also been present in horticulture: men hunt and gather; women care and tend. For horticulture, this has meant men have traditionally been the gardeners and plant hunters, while women used the crops and worked with floristry.

This story is from the September 2024 edition of Gardens Illustrated.

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This story is from the September 2024 edition of Gardens Illustrated.

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