Carol Klein - a woman for all seasons

We like Carol Klein here at Sapphic Central. Her no nonsense enthusiasm for her subject is infectious. Even I – the reluctant gardener – feel like ‘giving it a go’ after watching and listening to her on a Friday night. In fact, I was just building up the momentum to take on my own leaf-smothered, sopping autumn garden, when she and the rest of the Gardeners’ World team disappeared off our screens until Christmas! But fear not, knowing the end of the series was nigh and knowing how bereft us digging women would be, we managed to secure an interview with Carol that will help prolong her presence in our minds until her festive reappearance in the Gardeners’ World Christmas special.

It’s weird calling someone that you regularly see on the TV, because you actually feel like you already know them, even though you so obviously don’t. I have to say though that Carol Klein comes across as enthusiastic about gardening in real life as she does on camera, and although she has lived in Devon for almost 30 years her northern roots (excuse the pun) still manage to shine through.

This year’s Gardeners’ World saw Carol establish a cuttings, seeds and divisions garden – spectacularly showing for all to see that gardening needn’t be an expensive hobby. Since this is how she started her own successful nursery (through propagating plants she couldn’t afford to buy at the time, and then selling off the ‘spares’) I asked her if this is still something that is close to her heart. “It’s my favourite part of gardening,” she says, “you learn so much about a plant when you’re propagating it, or trying to propagate it, if you’ve never done it before. I still get exactly the same thrill now seeing a plant grow from seed or a cutting as I did when I first started doing it. I just never get bored. And what’s best about it is that it isn’t expensive and it actually isn’t very hard, anyone can do it – all you need to do is give it a go and see what happens.”

Have things changed much, I asked since she started gardening? “There’s definitely a different attitude to plants now,” she responds. “When I first started selling plants – 24 years ago, it was around the time I had Alice (her youngest daughter) I think people used to impulse buy more. They didn’t care where they were putting them; they just liked the look of a plant I think. But now people put a lot more thought into buying plants – probably because they’re so expensive – but they want to know how to care for them, where to plant them, when they’ll flower … yes, I think it’s changed.” Did she put that down to the glut of gardening programmes that have emerged over the last couple of decades I wondered? “Hmmm … well the whole makeover thing never really helped you know. They never really informed you about the plants did they? Designers coming in and transforming a space is fine but then who has to look after the whole thing when they leave?” I immediately give up the notion of asking her around to transform our own back garden (my girlfriend will be gutted).

So Carol, I say, with a budget very firmly in mind, if there is one garden tool worth spending money on, what would you recommend? “Can I have two?” she quips immediately. Go on then, I say. “Seed trays and a penknife,” she says firmly. “I couldn’t do without my penknife … on Gardeners’ World they try to get me to use these newfangled things but I just can’t be doing with them. My knife’s got a steel blade and a wooden handle. Oh, and it’s called Tina.” She starts laughing, “Isn’t that a lovely name for a knife? It’s actually what it’s called – the make of it – before you think I’ve named it myself,” she continues giggling. (It’s true, I looked it up! Tina knives indeed exist – if sources (other than Carol) are to be believed they are the ‘best horticultural knives on the market’, and worth the ‘investment’ label since they retail at around £50.00 each).

I found a black and white photographic portrait of you on the web, I explained, and its title was “Carol Klein – plantswoman and teacher of art”. If you had to choose one, what label would you feel most comfortable with, I ask her. “I think I’m a plantswoman and a gardener, if I had to attach any label,” she muses but you can tell that she feels more comfortable talking about the plants that she loves rather than herself. Not giving up at the first hurdle though, I ask her what she thinks is the quality that has made her successful. “I don’t know that I am successful,” is her immediate response, “I’m persistent and unstoppable!” Then she starts laughing again, “What’s the one thing that makes me successful Neil?” she shouts to her husband then giggles as she passes on his response “He says it’s my lipstick … I don’t know though, I just love what I do … I think maybe that comes across.”

Given the opening with the lipstick comment I ask her the all important question – does she wear lip balm – to which (thankfully) it’s a resounding no “… although in the real depths of winter I might use it.” Neither is Carol Klein a woman who gardens to music: “I love listening to insects and we get really fantastic sky down here – music would just get in the way”, although when she does listen to music she admits a penchant for rock and roll along with blues artists like Nina Simone, Billie Holiday and Lou Reed. She used to cook a lot too, but now Neil does most of it – the whole family are vegetarian, although Carol and Neil also eat fish. ‘The family’ consists of Neil and their two daughters Annie (26) and Alice (24) – the ‘achievements’ in Carol’s life that she is most proud of.

And the things that she dislikes? “Lawns! What a waste of space, it’s monoculture gone mad – imagine how many plants you can put in the place of a lawn, you only need a path to get around!” She also dislikes gardens that clash with their natural surroundings.

Can she tell the difference between a man’s garden and woman’s; or a northerner’s and a southerner’s I ask her, “I’m going to really generalise now but I think a lot of northern gardens have evolved through doing things for themselves – I think it’s more do with history really; less dosh being around, rather than anything else. Blokes are often more regimented – although the gay men I know don’t fall into that category, they seem to favour colour and form more than their straight counterparts, but then that’s such a sweeping generalisation – there’s so much knowledge out there, it’s fantastic.” It’s what makes Gardeners’ World such a challenge she says, trying to keep everyone interested.

We spend some time talking about her other projects – she now writes a regular gardening column for the Guardian, she has a book project on the go, a two-week ‘Open Gardens’ daytime series has recently aired on BBC2, she is currently filming for a vegetable programme that is due out in the new year (that she has been filming since March) – all in all Carol Klein is a busy woman, and you know what that means? She is not likely to be away from our screens for too long! Roll on Christmas!