Sustainable, bee-friendly design takes Silver-Gilt prize at prestigious Irish gardening festival
A show garden supported by Davis Events Agency has been awarded a Silver-Gilt medal at Ireland’s largest gardening festival, Bord Bia Bloom, in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. The annual event ran through the June bank holiday weekend attracting thousands of visitors.
Davis Events Agency teamed up with garden sponsor Pink Lady® apples and garden designer Cornelia Raftery to create The Pink Lady® Balcony. It was designed as a sustainable, bee-friendly balcony garden that highlights the important role that pollinating insects play in the production of fruiting trees and plants. It features a variety of hawthorn that provides spring blossom and autumn colour as well as pale pink and white flowers to represent Pink Lady® apples.
The garden – built on-site by the Davis Events team – also features log piles to provide homes for pollinators while the trim made from sedum provides sustainable drainage and supports biodiversity. The aim of the design is to offer viewers the opportunity to connect with nature and learn about the importance of bees. Pink Lady® also engaged The Federation of Irish Beekeepers Associations who brought some bees along so visitors can see them in action.
Designer Cornelia Raftery says she’s thrilled: “This is such an appealing garden to work on and look at – the colours are fantastic, and it represents such a simple but effective message – anyone can create a lovely display in a small space that does good for the pollinators and the environment we live in”.
CEO and founder of Davis Events Agency Paul Davis says Cornelia’s message is aligned closely with their aims as a company: “We were delighted to team up with Pink Lady® apples for its first activation at Bord Bia Bloom, particularly as they and Cornelia were thinking along the same lines as ourselves. We prioritise sustainability in all our projects and Bloom is a fantastic opportunity to demonstrate it so clearly. We’d like to congratulate Cornelia and the Pink Lady® team and thank them for choosing to work with Davis Events Agency this year”.
