‘The Lost Garden’ of Red Rocket Hut
Our part of Fowey Regatta Traders Carnival
This page is a summery of our ideas relating to the ‘Cornwall past and present theme.’
The Team…
Centre: Owners Deb and David
Right: Artist Kirsten Jones, Wine Broker and photographer Aleks Marinkovic
Left: Nic and Kaia, part of the amazing Red Rocket team!
Our Inspiration… The Lost Gardens of Heligan!
Heligan became ‘lost’ after the gardeners who were so crucial to the running of the estate went off to fight for King and country in the Great War of 1914-18. At least 13 of the outdoor staff served in the war; tragically, nine of them gave their lives.
Their loss shattered this tight-knit community; Heligan House was rented out and the wider estate was abandoned, falling into disrepair.
It was only in the 1990s that this horticultural time capsule was brought back to life by a team headed by archaeologist Tim Smit, who also co-founded The Eden Project.
More than 300 varieties of fruit and vegetable are being grown again by traditional methods.
Our cardboard creations reference fruits flowers and foliage, sculptures past and present from this magical garden.
Plants from Par Garden Centre fill the space. Essentially nature is everything - a constant in Cornwall throughout time!
The style is inspired by Cornish artists Patrick Caulfield and Terry Frost, all created by local artist Kirsten Jones.
Every painting is on recycled cardboard.. if we look after our present resources and the sea, our future will be a better one.
Man-made sculptures The Giant’s Head
and The Mud Maid blend with nature.
The Melon Garden has of the country's only remaining manure-heated pineapple pits where varieties have fruited again.
Also citrus, vine and peach plus Himalayan strawberry (left)
The great walled Flower Garden has the most comprehensive collection of Victorian cut flowers.
The "Jungle" was created as a place for experimenting with sub-tropical plants, a passion that swept the country 150 years ago.
It is home to the largest collection of tree ferns in Europe and is a paradise for palms, bamboos and exotic specimen trees
Past gardeners are remembered with their names written on herb labels, a moving tribute. The people have passed on but the plant species they cherished are still with us today.
In the same way we have labels and wooden sticks so that visitors to Red Rocket Lost Gardens can write the name of a person past or present who they would like to remember during this Regatta.
‘The Love-iathan’
Sightings of sea creatures and monsters have always been part of Cornish history.
Our splendid cardboard creature is a take on The ‘Leviathan’ which was spotted in 1906 off Land’s End.
Just as Heligan hopes to encourage indigenous creatures by creating a wonderful environment, we hope that our efforts may invite this spectacular Serpent to pop in for a cappuccino and a bit of cake.
A bespoke Red Rocket rose wine and charity donations
Our Provence rosé and white wine with a label designed to commemorate our Fowey Royal Regatta.
A donation of £1 on every bottle purchased goes to Surfers against Sewage.
All the cardboard creations are for sale, proceeds go to RNLI
A team effort :
Working with artist Kirsten Jones, we used recycled cardboard and other found materials to create our Lost Garden.
The Lost Valley is an area of Heligan with a history of charcoal burning, As a nod to this idea we used black and white as our main palette, inspired by the Cornish flag with splashes and pops of colour.
Below are some photos of the work in progress. Thanks to everyone who helped make our Regatta happen!
