Sarah Raven | A Year of Cut Flowers: a life of growing and arranging for all seasons
Thu 23 Apr 2026 | 6:00pm - 7:00pm
Teacher, broadcaster and founder of her eponymous mail-order plant nursery, Sarah Raven is a true pioneer of productive, beautiful gardening. Drawing on decades of experimentation at her celebrated garden at Perch Hill, she has transformed how we think about growing flowers and food together, combining abundance with elegance and colour.
In this event, Sarah shares the secrets behind year-round success, from sowing and selecting high-performing plants to designing gardens that overflow with scent, structure and seasonal interest. Packed with practical advice and hard-won wisdom, her approach makes even ambitious gardening feel achievable. Join Sarah for an inspiring and generously informative session that will change the way you garden, whether your patch is a windowsill or an acre – and send you home brimming with ideas, confidence and fingers greener than ever!
Chaired by broadcaster Alex Clark.
Venue: TTP Stage (Cambridge Union)
Duration: 1 hour
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Author Biography
Sarah Raven has led the way over the last three decades in introducing a new kind of productive gardening which fuses intense colour, elegance and do-ability, bridging all kinds of gardening from dark rich dahlia glories to subtler smoky modern colours of poppies, roses, sweet peas, and all kinds of vegetable deliciousness. She is a teacher, broadcaster, has a popular gardening podcast Grow, Cook, Eat, Arrange, and runs a mail order plant nursery, (with 500,000 customers). She is also the author of many books on gardening and cooking.
Chair Biography
Alex Clark is a broadcaster and journalist, who writes for many publications including the Guardian, the Observer, and the Times Literary Supplement. She is a co-host on the Graham Norton Book Club for Audible and hosts the TLS podcast. She is a professional chairperson and appears all over the UK at Cheltenham, Hay and the Southbank Centre. Alex is a festival Honorary Patron.
