Hosted by Tom Stuart-Smith Studio, Working with Earth: Architecture and Landscape is a two day symposium of forward-thinking discussions, shared knowledge, practical demonstrations and garden tours. It brings together a community of some of the most innovative, creative and acclaimed minds in sustainable Architecture and Landscape Architecture working in the UK today.
Speakers and demonstrators include Material Cultures (George Massoud and Paloma Gormley), Feilden Fowles (Edmund Fowles) Local Works (Loretta Bosence and Ben Bosence), Sarah Price, Cleve West, Tom Massey, Tom Stuart-Smith, Ben Stuart-Smith and Millie Souter.
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Earth is a versatile, timeless and sustainable material that has been used in architecture and landscape design for millennia; it holds the power to sequester carbon, to insulate, to express local materials in our built environment and to connect us more closely to place.
The Working with Earth symposium takes place in a newly opened venue The Apple House, at the heart of the Plant Library with 1500 herbaceous perennials and home to the Serge Hill Project for Gardening, Creativity and Health. The building, designed by architect Ben Stuart-Smith at the design collective Okra, was created using almost exclusively natural materials above ground level, including hempcrete walls, split oak cladding and an unfired clay floor.
Tickets include a vegetarian homecooked lunch and refreshments - plus drinks, canapes and music on the opening night, Thursday 3 October.
Full symposium and individual day tickets are available, with Thursday 3 October focussing on Architecture and Friday 4 October focussing on Landscape.
Speaker biographies
- Loretta and Ben Bosence, Local Works Studio
Loretta and Ben Bosence are co-founders and co-directors of Local Works Studio. We are designers, builders and hands-on circular economy specialists, focusing on the creative reuse of site-based materials, local manufacture and processing. We provide sensitive, collaborative design, innovative craftsmanship, and holistic strategies for participatory shaping and improvement of our environments. Projects include: Chelsea Flower Show 2023 with Sarah Price Landscapes, Revival of Bramcote Park, London, Design & production of garden features using waste & surplus materials, Maggie’s Centre, Southampton and Circular Wisley, Material reuse strategy, Royal Horticultural Society.
- Edmund Fowles, Feilden Fowles
Edmund co-founded Feilden Fowles in 2009, an award-winning practice with a wealth of experience and passion for arts, cultural and education buildings. In the last five years, the practice has worked with clients including the Natural History Museum, Tate, the Horniman Museum, the National Railway Museum and Towner Gallery.
The work of the practice has been recognised with a number of awards, most recently: 2024 RIBA National Award (Dining Hall, Homerton College, University of Cambridge).
- Tom Massey, Tom Massey Studio
"Known for bold, daring and thoughtful landscapes, Tom has won multiple awards and gained widespread recognition since founding Tom Massey Studio in 2015, most recently a gold medal for the WaterAid Garden at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2024.
He is listed in House & Garden magazine’s ‘Top 50 Garden Designers’, Country & Town House ‘20 Finest Landscape Designers’ and Pro Landscaper magazine’s 25 most influential.
Tom’s first book ‘RHS Resilient Garden' (DK 2023) is a future focused book grounded in the latest RHS research, detailing how to work with nature and adapt your outdoor space to be more resilient to the affects of climate change. In 2024 Tom was named by House & Garden magazine as the ‘Responsible Designer’ of the year, testament to the studio’s efforts to design with environmental responsibility at the fore.”
- George Massoud and Paloma Gormley – Material Cultures
Material Cultures is a design and research organisation led by Summer Islam, Paloma Gormley and George Massoud, working at the intersection of natural materials, low embodied carbon construction and construction technology. We argue for the reintegration of architecture and agriculture, understanding buildings as irrevocably linked to landscapes of extraction. Bio-based materials are low in embodied carbon and offer an alternative to the globally sourced, carbon-intensive, socially destructive materials commonly used in the construction industry. We challenge the systems, technologies, processes, supply chains, regulations and materials that make up the construction industry with the aim of transforming the way we build.
- Sarah Price – Sarah Price Landscapes
Sarah Price has rapidly established herself as one of the most prominent and sought-after garden designers in Britain. Drawing on a prior training in fine art and a life-long love of wild and natural environments, her gardens have an immersive quality and are often described as ‘painterly’.
Her practice is unusual for its breadth and scope of work. Sarah co-designed the 2012 Gardens at London’s Olympic Park and was a planting consultant for LDA Design on the post-Games legacy design. Price continues to work on a number of large public planting schemes as well as private projects.
- Ben Stuart-Smith – Okra
Okra is a multi-disciplinary collective based on the Old Kent Road specialising in architecture, urban research and educational outreach.Through each project we apply our expertise to open up the built environment to all, and to strengthen, celebrate and empower communities.
We work with a range of organisations including Local Authorities, Housing Associations, Arts & Community Groups, and Artists. Clients and collaborators include Merton Council, Southwark Council, Poplar Harca, The Architecture Foundation, London Metropolitan University, Open City, the Barbican, Frank’s Café, Bold Tendencies and the South London Gallery.
- Tom Stuart-Smith – Tom Stuart-Smith Studio
Tom Stuart-Smith is a landscape architect whose work combines naturalism with modernity and built forms with romantic planting.
Recent projects in the public domain include several projects at Chatsworth, a new public garden at the Hepworth Wakefield, and the masterplan for RHS Garden Bridgewater, which is one of the largest new garden projects in Europe. 2021 saw the completion of a new Islamic garden, Jellicoe Gardens in Kings Cross, commissioned by the Aga Khan Development Network and Argent, and 2022 will see the dramatic recasting of a garden by St Pauls Cathedral in the City of London which has a 100m² water basin at its centre, reflecting Sir Christopher Wren’s famous dome. Other projects include a Knepp Castle Walled Garden that seeks to maximise biodiversity, and a castle on Loch Ness in Scotland.
Previous projects have included Her Majesty the Queen's Jubilee Garden at Windsor Castle, Trentham Gardens in Staffordshire, the Bicentenary Glasshouse Garden at RHS Garden Wisley and the Keeper’s House Garden at the Royal Academy of Arts.
- Cleve West
Cleve is an award-winning landscape garden designer based in south-west London.
With sustainability at the cornerstone of Cleve’s philosophy, materials and plants are carefully selected to provide food and habitat for local fauna. Cleve has won a total of 10 RHS Gold Medals (seven at the Chelsea Flower Show) with two winning the coveted Best in Show. His design for Horatio's Garden (at the Duke of Cornwall's Spinal Treatment Centre, Salisbury) won three Society of Garden Designers Awards in 2015.
Accessibility
Accessible parking for those who require it is available at the entry to The Apple House. There is step-free access to the building and all areas. However, there are many potential trip hazards and uneven surfaces that may be encountered whilst visiting the gardens, along with gravel paths that aren’t suitable for walking frames with wheels. Please be aware that due to the ongoing building works around the Apple House, there may be additional hazards to look out for.