The story behind the RES Garden.

We're so proud of this garden and the work it's taken to get here. It's been a fantastic opportunity to bring attention to the importance of insects, what they do for ecology and humanity, and simple things that can be done in everyone's garden to help them flourish.


With huge thanks to:
Project Giving Back for the generous garden funding and incredible support
Tom Massey for his wonderful design and superb eye for detail
Hortus Loci for the wonderful palette of plants perfect for insects to thrive
Landscape Associates for bringing Tom's design to life
Cake Industries, with support from N55, Anne Romme and Anne Bagger, for the design and fabrication of the outdoor laboratory
Water Artisans for realising the water element of Tom's design
Surrey Ironcraft for their skilled metalworks throughout the garden
John Little at the Grass Roof Company for support with varied insect habitat creation and brownfield site exploration
Thread Architects and Mule Studio for their additional support with the design
Ashwells Timber for the fallen wood that brings our insect garden to life.
The brilliant volunteer planting team and all the RES Trustees & volunteers who will be welcoming visitors to the garden throughout next week

Thanks also to:
Bakers Consultants for the innovative 'soil listening station' that analyses insect life within the soil to measure soil health
UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology for their state of the art AI moth trap, which will be monitoring night time visitors to the garden
The RHS entomology team for their help with pollinator monitoring, which will be taking place on the garden throughout show week.

Additional thanks go to Lendlease and the brilliant team at IQL Stratford who have all grasped the nettle (as it were) and thrown themselves into the relocation of this garden as an important haven for urban wildlife and a living resource to inspire future insect scientists.

And finally thanks to Matt Greenwell and the PGB team for producing this lovely short film on our behalf.