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What The Gardening Mind is all about - and how to join this worldwide community of garden-lovers

Jan 01, 2023

Me wrapped around a sculpture I designed for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show

Hello and welcome!

“THE best gardening newsletter bar none. Incredibly generous, helpful, useful advice whether you're an old hand or a complete novice. Essential.” - India Knight

Hello - my name is Jo Thompson and I’m so delighted to have you here in my proper home: The Gardening Mind.

Thanks to subscribers, The Gardening Mind has become a wonderful worldwide gardening community club, and I’d absolutely love you to come and join us.

This is the journey I’d like to take you on in The Gardening Mind: I want to share with you everything I know. I also want to continue to build this worldwide community of garden and nature lovers - we have members in 50 US states and 165 countries and that’s A LOT of nature lovers. I want us to lean on one another. Ask questions. Have the occasional meet-up online and in real life.

Whether you sign up for free or upgrade to a paid subscription, I hope you’ll join me. Let’s do this.

What’s in it for you: what do you get for just over £1 a week?

Well, I’m sharing with you everything I’ve learned as a garden designer over the last 30 years, so I’ll take you step-by-step though how to plant a flowerbed, how to tackle a new garden, and how to make transform a garden space, whatever the size.
As well as regular planting tutorials, you get access to courses like the Small Garden Design course, which you can follow at your own pace and then have a catch-up with me if you’d like.
We have a private Chat thread (a bit like a Whastapp group) where you get to share photos of your green space with all of us. We try to problem-solve, we identify mystery plants, and we chat about what’s going on in your garden/windowbox/community garden/windowsill.
This community is for everyone - whether you’re just starting outdoor or whether you’ve been gardening forever - there’s something in it for you.
We have Zooms where I give tuition on a range of things: small garden design, plants, garden style, and I offer you peeks and sneak previews into events like the RHS Chelsea Flower Show.
Our Gardener’s Question Times go crazy because of this - a fun part of the month, you get to ask a question, and remember, no question is too stupid to ask.
There are other items to dip in and out of - book clubs and real-life meet-ups at beautiful gardens
All of my writing. Every so often there’s a completely free article, but usually, the key part is for paid subscribers only
Early access to new dates as they are released for my one-to-one mentoring Meetings
The ‘Digging Around with’ interviews with amazing people who share their gardening story

Then, there’s Gold Membership. As ever, I want to give you VALUE:

Gold Membership holders receive copies of my new books, the chance to come and visit events such as the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, and hugely-reduced one to one meeting prices.
And of course, there’s more - essentially, I aim to give you VALUE for £1.12 a week - access to a multi-award winning garden designer and author.
Free subscribers have access to
- Occasional free posts

About me

So who am I? Well, most people know me as a garden designer. I sometimes pop up on Gardener’s World. Over the years I’ve even won a few Chelsea gold medals for my work, which to this day still surprises me, truth be told. I’m also a rose obsessive, a Labrador-lover (expect to see lots of my gardening helper Basil here), as well as someone who passionately believes that anyone - and I mean even the most clueless gardener in the world - can become a wonderful plants person. How do I know this? Because that clueless person used to be me.

I knew nothing about gardening until I hit my 30s. Before that I was a primary school teacher dreaming of a little more space in my tiny west London flat. I found that space by creating a garden oasis on a teeny forgotten terrace that came with the flat. I didn’t do much to it - a few plants, flowers, a couple of chairs..nothing more. Certainly nothing extravagant. It not only transformed my home, but it transformed me. After that I retrained to become a garden designer. That was nearly 30 years ago now, but in that time I’ve accumulated so much knowledge- as well as a hell of a lot of garden trivia! But here’s the problem: who do I have to pass it on to?

The answer is YOU.

What readers say

“Jo Thompson is renowned for imbuing her gardens with atmosphere, something she achieves with the help of a highly tuned sense of colour.” — The Sunday Times

“A designer who has always been refreshingly down to earth, Thompson is now making her colour-led approach even more accessible through The Gardening Mind, a Substack newsletter that shares insights about designing for all kinds of gardens.” —Country Living

“The sophistication of the designs and level of craftsmanship and plantsmanship elevate them beyond their setting.” — The Washington Post

“I love your encouraging and friendly spirit!” — Will Taylor

“I love your writing voice, as well as your approach to gardens and plants.”

“How refreshing it was to read something that I actually understood! I'm not a complete beginner but I've only really been gardening for a few years and find most gardening related media a bit complex and unachievable! I'm so excited to be part of your community. Thank you!”

“All the elements go to make up the very best gardening magazine available anywhere, whether in print or online. Here's to another great year with The Gardening Mind!”

"As a budding garden designer I appreciate your very practical advice on aesthetics and garden choices. I also recently got your Gardener's Palette and find your very practical insights and guidance, as well as your references to art and culture, hugely valuable and engaging.“

“I love seeing the 'workings' behind a beautiful garden photo: the thought - and long experience - that can turn bare earth into a that little slice of heaven we call a garden. Your case studies are utterly beguiling, and I'm looking forward to exploring more.”

“I’m a landscape architect in the American West working largely on farms and rural landscapes. I am here to learn and to glean from your experience how to create softer, more contextual designs."

Join our community

Please do join us - you’ll be part of a warm, friendly, welcoming community of people who share your interests. These interests in the world of all things to do with the magic of nature and landscape are the best interests - so we’d love to have you with us.

And you can also gift this subscription - I know we have a lot of members who have been gifted their membership - gifting a subscription makes for an easy thoughtful present, and avoids the buying of stuff which you kind of feel people just don’t want any more.

Give a gift subscription

Now, the bit that explains HOW TO FIND YOUR WAY AROUND:

With The Gardening Mind having quickly grown into a kind of magazine for us all, I’ve got a feeling that now might be a really good time to just have a bit of a look round the home page, in order to do a bit of orientation.

There are lots and lots of features here, and as Substack develops, more things are added, and so I’m gathering up the key elements here for you to have a bit of a poke around and a play with. Always know that I try to make all of this content to suit you, so that you can observe from a quiet place, or engage - a little, or a lot. You have total freedom to read and think, suggest subjects, ask questions, send in ideas, be quiet, be loud - whatever and however you like best to go about things. It’s for you.

As you potter around, remember that The Gardening Mind is meant to be fun and I really hope you enjoy it. So….. do scroll around, tour around and have an investigation around the following at your leisure.

And look out for the Zooms that I hold on ‘Finding your way around Substack and The Gardening Mind’ - there’s one coming up very soon.

On your computer

You’ll see:

The New tab takes you to the most recent post. If you hit Community, you’ll be able to access the most recent comments, and if you go to the really useful magnifying glass icon, you’ll be able to search the whole publication.

There’s also a Substack app for your phone, which is fun as it means we can continue to chat - just open the app, see a comment and hit the speech bubble to reply:

Join Jo Thompson’s subscriber chat

Available in the Substack app and on web

You can see these following categories below the main posts - just scroll down the page:

Home is what it says on the tin -

Chat is a link to download the Substack app on your phone and then you’ll be able to join in the Chat itself, which is kind of a whats-app group for us all. I can start discussions off for us here, and so can paid subscribers too. The great thing is that you too can post your photos here, and we have our regular Sunday Show Us Your Plots photo-sharing - it’s fun!

I often hold Zoom sessions for paying subscribers on how to use the various Substack features, so look out for new dates!

Meetings Many of you have questions, subjects and general thoughts that you’d like to explore on a one-to-one basis: this Meetings feature is for exactly that. Whether you’re a student, new designer, homeowner, keen amateur, professional - there’s a true range of you who take up the slots as I release them. Subjects we’ve talked about have ranged from regular career mentoring, how to design and submit a show garden, garden quandaries, and specific planting design issues, just to name a few, and it’s just so lovely to receive your feedback as you implement ideas I’ve suggested and discusse. The good news is that due to demand, more of these slots will be released in the coming months: paying subscribers get first access to these. I started off many years ago as a teacher, and I absolutely love it. No question is too small or too silly.

Archive is where you find all old posts in chronological order.

About is where I tell you my story