2025 Workshops
Harvesting Autumn
Creative cooking with unusual edibles
with Beth Alexander
Friday 5 September 2025
Come and share the seasonal abundance here at Damson Farm. Beth Alexander will be here for the day to share her passion for creative and sustainable cooking. There will be ideas for working with some unusual edibles, reducing food waste, practical tips for preserving and creative ways of using seasonal gluts from our gardens, allotments and hedgerows.
Beth will cook up a delicious lunch and we’ll make some preserves in the afternoon which you can take home.
Beth (nee al Rikabi) is a local forager, food writer and retreat chef with 20 years experience. She is also known as The Free Range Chef.
For more details click here
Photo: Matt Inwood
Cultivating Presence
Reassessing how and why we garden
with Alys Fowler
Friday 12 September 2025
“The wonderful Annie Dillard once wrote ‘how we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives’ in an essay on existential tensions between presence and productivity. I often think of this essay when gardening, because how we garden is also a measure of who we are.
Let us come together to explore this idea. Let us examine how and why we garden and look for ways in which we might create better relations with these places and all those that dwell in them, from the soil community to the many more-than-humans who call our gardens home.” Alys Fowler
£140.00
For more details click here_.
Photo: Roo Lewis
Drying Flowers
and Autumn Wreath
with Bex Partridge of Botanical Tales
Friday 26 September 2025
Bex will spend the morning explaining how to dry a wide range of different plants. She will then demonstrate how to make a beautiful autumn wreath in the afternoon. She will explain the methods she uses to ensure that her work is as sustainable as possible. There will be armfuls of Bex’s own grown flowers for you to work with and you will also be able to forage for additional material in the garden at Damson Farm.
£140.00
For more details click here.
Soil, Sand and Sward
with Sarah Price
Thursday 2 October 2025
Friday 3 October 2025
Sarah has been developing her own 2 acre garden on the edge of the Black Mountains over the last few years. It is here that she has had the freedom to experiment with different techniques and observe how plants respond in harsh environments such as low nutrient substrate or a competitive grassy sward.
In this workshop Sarah will discuss her influences and share what she has learned from her experiments as she has observed how her garden has evolved.
Sarah Price is one of Britain’s most respected garden designers. Her work is inspired by her life long love of wild landscapes and her fine art training.
£140.00
For more details click here
Visual Story Telling
Developing a personal style in garden photography
with Eva Nemeth
Friday 10 October 2025
Saturday 11 October 2025
In this one day workshop Eva Nemeth will explore the art of visual story telling. She describes her approach as ‘quiet observation’ and says that it’s not so much about the equipment you use but developing a personal way of looking. The aim of the day will be to help you find your own focus to set you on the path to capture your own unique stories.
This is an advanced workshop, suitable for those already familiar with the settings on their DSLR or mirrorless cameras.
£160.00
For more details click here
Photo: Eva Nemeth
Drypoint Etching
with Allie Sylvester
Friday 17 October 2025
Allie will introduce a straightforward approach to this printing technique which produces finely detailed images.
We’ll use the autumnal seedheads and skeletal structures in the garden at Damson Farm as inspiration.
You’ll create a series of A5 prints on specialist paper to take home.
Suitable for all levels of experience.
£140.00
For more details click here.
Experimental Painting
with Allie Sylvester
Saturday 18 October 2025
Allie will be demonstrating a number of creative techniques to achieve a wide variety of effects and will then encourage you to experiment for yourself.
We’ll be taking inspiration from the textured planting and patinated surfaces out in the garden at Damson Farm. Mossy walls, lichened stone, vintage galvanised planters and foliage all reveal intricate tones and textures on close inspection.
Suitable for all levels of experience.
£140.00
For more details click here.