Interview with Andrew Jackson

His work grows out of close observation and a conviction that even the most ordinary spaces — including the much-maligned new-build plot — can become landscapes of beauty, meaning and ecological value when approached with care and patience.

Writing from his garden in East Yorkshire, Andrew charts the slow transformation of a blank canvas into a place shaped by seasons, soil and lived experience. What began as compacted ground and developer turf has become a setting for experimentation and attentiveness: learning how plants respond to exposure and shelter, how structure can support wildness, and how restraint often matters more than intervention. Much like the gardeners featured in Agriframes’ View from the Garden series, his approach is grounded in curiosity — watching closely, adjusting gently, and allowing the garden to reveal itself over time.

Andrew is particularly interested in the idea of making place — how thoughtful design, simple frameworks and natural planting can create gardens that feel settled and purposeful, even when young. He favours structure that anchors a garden through winter, planting that earns its place through resilience and beauty, and materials that weather gracefully rather than dominate. Wildlife is welcomed not as an afterthought, but as an integral part of a garden’s success.

Through his writing and design work, Andrew reflects on gardening as a quiet, lifelong practice: one that rewards noticing small changes, accepting failure, and understanding that the most satisfying gardens are shaped as much by listening as by doing. His work encourages a slower, more responsive relationship with outdoor space — where gardens are allowed to evolve naturally, and where the gardener is as much a steward as a creator.

About You

Tell us a little bit about how your love for gardening began and how it inspires your work? 

My love of gardening arrived quietly rather than by inheritance. Like many people I began with a new build garden a place of compacted ground and developer turf where the idea of gardening felt provisional, almost borrowed. At first I approached it with plans and certainty but the garden soon taught me that it would not be hurried or commanded.

What changed everything was learning to pay attention. To notice where frost lingered longest, how water behaved after rain, which plants settled and which resisted every attempt to make them stay. Gardening became less about improvement and more about conversation. That way of seeing now underpins everything I do as a writer and designer.

The New Build Manifesto grew directly from that experience. It is a belief that these overlooked spaces are not empty or lacking but are places of genuine possibility when met with patience observation and care.

What are you most proud of in your career so far Tell us a little bit about the project?

Winning a Garden Media Guild Award was a moment of quiet affirmation. Not because of the recognition itself but because it acknowledged that stories about ordinary gardens and ordinary places are worth telling. Much of my work focuses on gardens that are still becoming themselves rather than those already finished and assured.

I am particularly proud of The New Build Manifesto because it gives voice to spaces that are often dismissed. It argues that meaning in a garden does not depend on age or grandeur but on attentiveness intention and ecological responsibility. Seeing that message resonate with homeowners designers and developers has been deeply encouraging.

What inspires you outdoors and when writing?

Inspiration comes from familiarity. From returning to the same patch of ground often enough to notice small shifts a plant leaning differently a bird arriving earlier than the year before a place that suddenly feels sheltered when it once felt bare.

When I write I am drawn to the same qualities I value in a garden restraint rhythm and honesty. I am deeply influenced by writers such as Laurie Lee and John Clare whose work shows how close attention to place can turn the everyday into something quietly profound. Their writing reminds me that noticing is itself a creative act.

About Your Garden as a living conversation

How has learning to watch rather than intervene changed the way you understand success in a garden?

Watching has taught me that success is not speed or perfection but resilience. A garden succeeds when it can cope with uncertainty weather and occasional neglect and still offer something back.

In my own garden stepping back revealed which plants genuinely belonged and which depended on constant correction. That shift made the garden stronger and made me more patient. It is no longer something I manage but something I listen to.

You are interested in the idea of making place especially in young or ordinary spaces What gives a garden a sense of belonging rather than novelty?

Belonging comes from alignment. Between soil and plant structure and exposure intention and time. Novelty demands attention but belonging settles quietly into the background.

In new gardens in particular there is a temptation to overfill and overdesign. But a sense of place emerges through repetition through winter structure and through materials that age and weather. A garden begins to belong when it feels inevitable as if it could only ever exist there.

What role does winter play in your design thinking and how do you ensure a garden holds its presence in the quieter months?

Winter reveals the truth of a garden. It strips everything back to form structure and balance. Without flowers to distract us we see whether the framework holds and whether the space still has weight and meaning.

I design with winter always in mind using strong underlying structure evergreen punctuation and plants that hold their shape and texture. If a garden works in winter it will be generous in every other season.

Tell us a little bit about your Agriframes products and how you have styled and used them?

I am drawn to structures that support a garden rather than dominate it and Agriframes pieces do that beautifully. I use them as quiet anchors giving clarity and intention to young planting while allowing plants time to grow into them.

As climbers establish and materials weather the structure becomes part of the garden rather than an addition to it. The best garden elements are those that feel more settled with each passing year.

Practical and Inspiring

Who are your biggest inspirations?

I return again and again to writers like John Clare and Laurie Lee whose deep attention to landscape reveals how entwined place and memory can be. Their work celebrates the ordinary field the overlooked edge and the slow passage of seasons.

I am also inspired by gardeners working patiently with difficult plots and limited means finding beauty through care rather than control.

When progress feels slow what keeps you engaged and optimistic?

Gardens teach you that slowness is not failure. It is how roots establish and relationships form. When progress feels almost imperceptible I remind myself that much of the work of a garden happens underground and out of sight.

Returning to the same space day after day season after season is an act of faith. And each year in its own way the garden answers back. Quietly but honestly. That is enough.