Toxteth in Liverpool has become increasingly derelict and unoccupied since the riots in the 1980s. Helen Hebden lives in the Granby Triangle, a group of four streets that is heavily unoccupied.
Ten years ago, some remaining residents decided to take control of the area by planting and greening-up the voids. They spruced up their own front gardens, and then went on to do the gardens of the derelict houses too.
They brightened up the streets with colourful plants, and painted all the front doors too.
Three years ago, one of the terraces was destroyed, leaving the residents with a third of an acre of rubble and dust. Undeterred, they began to prettify this eyesore too.
They clubbed together to rake it over and sowed wildflower seeds. It is now a rich and thriving wildflower meadow with over 50 different flower species recorded there.
Helen says “This project has forged friendships and strengthened our community. It is a joy to all who pass by, as well as the residents remaining on the streets.”
They now have a community group and meet regularly for events and parties.
That Bloomin’ Triangle won the Transformation Street Award, winning £500 of National Garden Gift Vouchers.
Judges were overwhelmed by the dramatic transformation, and thought the choice of wildflowers was inspired, as they thrive in poor soil where other plants would struggle.
They hailed it as an example of how gardening and community pride can completely rejuvenate an area.
Congratulations to everyone on That Bloomin’ Triangle!
You’ve seen the show, now check out what happens behind the scenes!
(Missed it? Watch it on ITVPlayer now!)
You can always tell which house is getting a makeover by ITV’s Love Your Garden – the front is packed out the front with plants, tools, vans, aggregate, paving slabs and a host of others. Here is a classic shot of what is happening when everything arrives. It’s ready to go in and start transforming the plot into something spectacular.
Here is Associate Producer Thea, the cheeky monkey, with a banana! There was a banana plant that we put into this show to give it a tropical theme. Thea grabbed some bananas from the catering van and stuck them on the plant. Everyone who saw it was amazed that the tree had fruit on it! “I can’t believe it is producing bananas!” they said. It wasn’t. Thea just put them there. And ate them afterwards.
Here’s Alan planting that massive palm in the corner. It always looks like the garden is fairly empty when you see it on TV, but as you can see here there are always loads of people around, including landscapers and the film crew. There’s even someone up on the roof of the summer house! Action is going on all the time when we’re doing these makeovers.
Next is Thea, Frances and myself. Thea finds most of the plants and features for the garden and co-ordinates them from the different suppliers, with different deliveries. It’s a mammoth task, and she does a great job.
Here we are filming the piece about water in the garden. The director Alice and cameraman are saying get your shorts on and get in the water David! They told me to walk in rather than jumping in, which is actually worse. It’s freezing cold and I had to swim down to the bottom, pop up on the surface, deliver a line and dive back down again. I managed to swallow quite a bit of water, which had a distinct taste of… er, duck poo.
Here are the hard landscapers from Frosts, Jon and Matt. These lads are hard-working guys with a real can-do attitude, and it’s been a pleasure to work with them throughout the whole series.
We do quite a bit of filming at Capel Manor Gardens – if you haven’t visited it, it is amazing. It’s like Chelsea Flower Show all year round. There are loads of mini show gardens there for people to visit. Here’s the beautiful lavender-lined path that leads up to the main house. It’s phenomenal place to go. Check it out at http://www.capelmanorgardens.co.uk/
Guy is always getting into these blogs! Here I caught him sitting down and would you believe it – he’s wearing odd socks! He does a lot of these things and always gets away with it. He’s our runner, and I had wondered why he wasn’t running very fast – but now we know! Odd socks, and probably an odd smell coming from them too!
Here are the two directors, Alice and Natalie explaining something they want me to do. I’m not sure what they are trying to indicate with their hands, but it was making me a bit nervous! While that’s going on, you can see Matt off to the side. By the look on his face, he’s obviously eyeing up somebody who’s walking in the street! Disgraceful.
Here’s our cameraman Steve giving me a filthy look for getting a big blob of cement on his camera! When he shouts ‘action!’ and I’m busy slapping down the cement, he’s got to learn to move back a bit. What else does he expect?
This is a picture of my front garden design for the show. I spent a bit of time with my team in the office putting our heads together for ideas before I went off on site. We wanted to create a nice-looking front garden – here’s the original sketch. We had to do some serious scrabbling around to find plants and features at short notice.
And here’s the final result! There’s me, with a cheesy grin, looking at our lovely green garden. I thought it was important to give each front garden a different personality, and I knew the girls would both do something flowery. I chose to do mine all with foliage, and we came up with this topiary concept.
This is our sound guy Mike. Talk about a sound expert – he looks like he’s going to do a DJ set in Ibiza! Especially with that hat. It was his favourite hat, apparently. He looks like a dude, and he controls all the sound as we record the programme.
It looks as if we’re all working back in the kitchens at Pizza Express! Three munchkins, eh? We’re supposed to wear these plastic covers on our shoes so we don’t walk mud into the house when we use the loo. I put one on my head and it made such a good hat, the girls copied it. It’s my favourite photo of the series!
This is the panicked bit at the end of the makeover, when we’re rushing to get everything together in time! We’re putting the finishing touches to the makeover. Here’s Alan moving the furniture into position.
Here is the team waiting outside while Alan shows Joan around the garden. Everybody is tired out. Right in the middle there is Shaun, one of our ace landscapers. He’s sitting down and playing Angry Birds on his phone! It was a great makeover.
