A big trip to a little garden


Last night, Turnaround’s marketing team had the pleasure of joining in on the launch for Steve Wheen’s – a.k.a. The Pothole GardenerThe Little Book of Little Gardens. If you haven’t heard of him, we suggest you remedy the situation right away. He’s one shining example of someone who brings beauty and creativity to the most unexpected spaces, notably by creating lovely miniature gardens in London’s (many) potholes. You can see what the global press, from The Guardian to Time Out to Oprah, are saying about him here.

We had a wonderful time, to say the least. Wheen celebrated the launch of his retrospective book at the Dalston Eastern Curve Garden, which is delightful enough when not accompanied by tiny-garden-related festivities, so imagine our joy when we were greeted by two performance artists portraying human gardens and given goodie bags with various veggie seeds, as well as miniatures of our own (we got an itty bitty spade and a wine bottle suitable for the likes of Barbie and Ken).
To make things even better, Wheen’s mum was floating about serving the most delicious, freshly made pizza and Jaimie Tullo lent his gorgeous voice and enviable guitar skills to add to the atmosphere. But our favourite bit had to be the photo booth, where we donned silly hats and stood in front of a green screen to mimic the effect of being in one of Wheen’s gardens.
Everyone was going wild hash-tagging the event at #LBLG, which sent our own social media extraordinaire into flurries of live blogging as she snapped away at the very photogenic plot.
It was certainly a night worthy of Steve Wheen’s fabulous new book, The Little Book of Little Gardens, which is available now from your favourite booksellers and published by our friends at Dokument Press. The book is fun and inspiring, but it is also an important look at today’s street art culture. It features a foreword from Kate McAuley.
So next time you’re walking down a crumbling sidewalk, look down, and try not to trample any of Steve Wheen’s lovely gardens!

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