Michael Gilson

Michael Gilson’s recent book explores the most important development in 20th British gardening – the suburban garden. Long downplayed, disregarded or sneered at from the heights of the country house lawn, this was when millions of, mostly working-class, people discovered gardening and created some half million new gardens. Michael focuses on Richard Sudell, the writer who advised them what to do with their plots, and who then went on to become a key figure in post-war landscape architecture. Michael Gilson is associate fellow of the School of Media, Arts and Humanities at the University of Sussex in Brighton, UK. He is an editor and journalist, and the author of Behind the Privet Hedge: Richard Sudell, the Suburban Garden and the Beautification of Britain (Reaktion Books, 2024).

reaktionbooks.co.uk

This chat was originally broadcast on Friday 28 February 2025.

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