VHS lecture: My dream garden is being created

Soon the spring season will begin and the garden will awaken to new life. In keeping with this, the VHS is now offering a lecture entitled "My dream garden is coming into being". Garden designer Dorothea Steffen will give practical tips. The lecture will take place on Thursday, 9 March, from 7.30 p.m. at the Bocholt Media Centre. Tickets cost 7 euros. Registration at www.vhs-bocholt.de.

"It's not how big a garden is, but how big the gardener's heart is," claims gardening expert Steffen. She was born with a passion for gardening. For decades she was intensively involved with roses and clematis, as well as with vegetable cultivation during an education in biodynamic agriculture. Today she is a garden designer with passion. For two years she has also been involved in the board of the Gesellschaft der Staudenfreunde e.V. as 1st vice-president.

Three years ago, Dorothea Steffen started her own large garden project when she moved to Essen. She lets the audience follow the story of how it came about with the help of impressive picture impressions combined with many practical tips. Her maxim for garden design is to use plants that are appropriate to the location, because in addition to a natural atmosphere and an eye for sustainability, this has the great advantage of being easy to maintain.

She herself remembers: "This garden had been waiting for me, embedded by forest and meadow and a river as a view. It only took seconds and I knew this could be my natural paradise." In the last three years she has created a multitude of very differently composed beds and is herself amazed at how many insects and birds are attracted by them. A lecture that is infectious and inspiring and shows that it is indeed possible to combine aesthetics and nature conservation in one's own garden.