RA Summer Exhibition and Hampton Court: Shared theme, very different moods

 Gardeners are instinctive optimists. The act of planting a tiny seed in March in hope of abundance six months later is annual proof. Artists are inspired by nature, too, but this year’s Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts, themed on climate, shows the artists on the pessimistic end of the spectrum.

About 40 percent of the work on display seethed with anger, while an equal number projected a deep melancholy. This being Great Britain, much of the negativity was infused with black humour, but it was still all a bit grim. A small, remaining percentage of the work celebrated the joy of what the climate brings us, and inspired change to protect it. 

Meanwhile, 14 miles west, another staple of the London season was far more cheerful. The Hampton Court Garden Festival celebrated urban micro-gardens, water saving, compost and bug houses, thronged with crowds who clearly believe their personal actions can make a difference … even if the blazing heat causing the gardens to droop was punishing proof of climate change.

I was fortunate to attend both in the same week, and enjoyed the contrast. In addition to sharing a theme this year, both are essentially big market places: new art in Piccadilly, plants and garden kit at the palace. But you have to be a lot richer to do any buying at the Royal Academy.

Had money been no object, my choice at the Exhibition would have been Jess de Wahls’ Nevertheless, she persisted, a work of embroidery roughly a metre square. At the top, an idyllic world lives under a golden dome of honeycomb, patrolled by protective bees. But at the mid point, one of their number struggles, and below him is a world of death. (Or is it her? The she of the title being the queen bee struggling to survive?) The contrast and vivid detail reminded me of those scenes that contrast heaven and hell with such drama in medieval Italian churches, and the sheer skill of the embroidery was masterful. In concept and execution, I can see (just about) spending £85,000 to take this one home, should I be the type of person to have that kind of cash.

One of the great delights of the Exhibition, of course, is wandering the galleries pretending you have untold millions to invest in art. What would you buy? There’s a lot of conceptual stuff here that falls into my  “you’re pulling my leg” category. Such as a page from a digital notepad, with some signatures on it, blown up to enormous size and called They came out of nowhere pointing to nowhere he said / Visitor book painting. Creator Ryan Gander (I can’t bring myself to award him the adjective artist) has the chutzpah to put a £90,000 price tag on this one.

Equally perplexing, though at least more attractive to have on a wall, was an oversized canvas of vegetables rendered in blocks of solid, bold colours. A quick hour on the computer for the corporate designers I work with, but Sir Michael Craig-Martin, a fully-accredited Royal Academician, is charging £69,500 for Untitled (with 2 carrots). To each his own.

While there’s plenty of this kind of thing to puzzle over (a bear sculpted of black fibre mauling Pinocchio, a child’s drawing of a football ground, four heads hanging from a triangular flood sign graffitied to say blood), there are bits and pieces of beauty throughout to captivate even the most passionate critic of modern art. A pair of masterful, large watercolours of the Grand Canyon with soil samples set in glass tubes within the mount to demonstrate the exact colours of reality, and how perfectly artist Tony Foster got to them, seemed excellent value for millionaire’s money at £72,500. (Should you be in the market, it’s called Hot and Dry / Hot and Wet - Grand Canyon rim to river/ 18 days)

I was intrigued by the old-meets-new conjunction of Rob and Nick Carter’s Transforming flowers in a vase. At first glance, in frame, subject matter and style it’s an old Dutch master still life of a vase of spring flowers. Only on close inspection do you realise it’s a photographic image. Even closer inspection tells you it’s not a  photo, but a film. The flowers slowly wither and die over the course of the 70-minute film, only to be regenerated to fresh perfection on a loop. This seemed a bargain at £30,000, and one I suspect many of those attending the Hampton Court Garden Festival would happily snap up if they had the cash.

But while Hampton Court is indeed a festival of shopping, an attendee would be hard pressed to spend £30,000 on anything. Maybe a posh conservatory or an enormous metal sculpted tree that’s also a fountain. But pleasures are more humble here. My most extravagant purchase was £30 on a single plant. Hosta Liberty is a new introduction with long stems, large leaves and a colour palette that turns from golden yellow to ivory cream as it matures. Not quite as much of a transformation as the Carters’ video, but at one thousandth of the price, how could I resist? It’s already planted out into my hosta bed (the tallest one in the centre) and will no doubt be its crowning glory.

Regular readers may remember that the Festival (re-branded from the Hampton Court Flower Show in 2019) has been an annual outing for me and the same two friends since 2010, and over that time our priorities have shifted more to the annual catch up than to display gardens. Which is a good thing, since there are a lot less of them here than there used to be.

I don’t know whether it’s a planned shift, or the lack of corporate sponsorship post pandemic, but the show gardens were so small and sparse to be mostly forgettable. The notable exception was a Ukrainian garden, where grasses and plants were starting to come back around the burned shell of a Ukrainian house. Another parallel to the Summer Exhibition here: powerful messaging but nothing I was planning to take home.

Corporate sponsors seem to have disappeared almost completely to be replaced by charities, whose gardens tend to concentrate more on getting a message across (like this year’s Alzheimer’s garden with a fibrous, menacing web of black stuff hanging over its paths) than innovative planting schemes, new plants or the latest trends in colour. We simply weren’t interested enough to give much of our attention to any. Admittedly, the fact that there wasn’t a cloud in the sky nor a hint of breeze and the temperature was pushing 30C discouraged us, as well.

We found the greatest interest, and creativity, in a series of allotment gardens. One devoted to menopause education, planted with herbs that support women’s health, was popular with we three women of a certain age. But our favourite was a veg plot that integrated hand-knitted elements for a bit of fun.

The greatest salvo of optimism … a huge counter to the gloom of the Summer Exhibition … was the schools section. Each year children are set a theme and various schools enter displays. This year was bug hotels, and the creativity was both smile-inducing and impressive. You could hear their “architectural” offerings provoking comments across visitors, who inevitably were sharing stories with each other about how much these simple little items improve the whole ecosystem of their gardens. Spending the day with thousands of people who are each making little improvements to help fight climate change left me feeling a good deal more cheerful than I had been a few nights before on Piccadilly.

As usual, we spent most of our time, and money, in the great plant marquee where all the specialist nurseries gather to show off new introductions along with the best of their existing plants. Despite three of us with mature gardens, we each managed some treasures. (In my case, along with the Liberty, two other hostas, three dahlias and a scented geranium, most of which are destined for pots.)

The music programme continues to expand since the Festival re-naming, and in different weather we might have lingered much more at the various stages. Instead we spent a hefty chunk of time in shady areas relaxing with cool drinks. If climate change makes this an average July, they’re going to have to consider shading more of the entertainment spots.

They’ll also need more food options. While much else has changed, the food trucks are still a long way from the dazzling profusion you might find at London hot spots like Borough Market. 

Both are something I suspect will be on planning lists, as the transformation continues. The direction is most obvious in this year’s introduction of a Flowers After Hours party on Friday night, with admission from 4-10, all the floral activities continuing and an uptick in the music. There’s even a silent disco. The fact that the RHS is charging almost £20 more for this event than the just under £39 members pay to go for the whole day says a lot.

The jury is out on whether or not our trio will ever convert to night time attendees and invite the boys along. I rather doubt it. We have our priorities. Whatever the changes, Hampton Court will remain an anchor in our social diaries.

A disappointing Hampton Court show prompts me to seek rose Mecca (and Arts & Crafts heaven)

Before I headed to the Cotswolds, I started my holiday at the Hampton Court Garden Festival. It was, to be honest, deeply inferior to past years. But it was so exciting to actual be at an annual milestone after 16 months of COVID cancellations ... and to be out in a crowd (limited to the fully vaccinated) ... that I could forgive its shortcomings.

Those included a decline in show gardens, sponsors and vendors. For the first time there were open plots where organisers obviously hadn't been able to sell space. The gardens themselves were bland in their near-uniformity. Everyone varied on the same themes: save the planet, and stay calm during a pandemic. The result was a lot of of shady spots for relaxation, outdoor kitchens, and naturalistic planting verging on the unkempt.

Only two gardens even inspired me to take out my camera. Tom Stewart-Smiths meadow planting gives a vision of the future of the UK that looks surprisingly like a field in central Missouri on a good day. I loved it, but even with climate change I'm sceptical about many of these heat-lovers would survive on our shores. The second I photographed for pure shock value. 

Its visual hook was an airplane crashed into a wheat field (representing genetically-modified monocultures) with luggage spilling from its severed tail. In case you missed the point, the "airline" branding was Homo Sapiens. Through the plane's shattered

cockpit you could see a small collection of plants that had survived multiple extinction events.  At the time I had a viscerally negative reaction, believing the wrecked plane was in spectacularly bad taste, but a week later it's the main thing I remember about this year's event. If a show garden is meant to get a message across, there’s probably never been better.

Amongst the vendors not attending was flower show stalwart David Austin Roses. Instead of their usual booth manned with staff ready to offer copious advice and sell you the year's latest varieties, they planted a curved bed of roses around some benches, put up labels with their flower show offer, and stayed home. Ironically, this decision on their part triggered the first day of holiday sightseeing on mine.

I had always wanted to get to their headquarters just north of Birmingham. It was rose season. From my Cotswolds starting point I was already halfway there. What the hell.

David Austin started selling his specially-bred roses in the 1960s and by his death in 2018 had become the leading light of the modern Rose world. His special genius was for combining the colours, shapes, and sense of old-fashioned roses with the repeat flowering of new ones. Today, I doubt there is a major garden anywhere in the world that doesn’t feature his creations. If gardening were a religion ... and for many, it certainly is ... then this might be its Mecca.


The gardens here are essentially the company showroom, demonstrating what more than five decades of patented roses look like in their full maturity. Breathtaking is a word that's lost its impact from overuse, but it's appropriate here. The beauty of this place in the middle of rose season is so overwhelming I was, briefly, physically overcome and needed to sit down to recover.

You start off on a patio full of enormous pots showing off the latest introductions. Beyond is the vast Long Garden, a connecting network of pergolas stretching more than 100 metres with three wide aisles, all packed with different roses. It's the biggest assemblage of roses I've ever seen in one garden. And I've seen a lot of gardens. Bushes, ramblers and climbers all jostle for your attention as they tumble together in a riot of colour. If the festive assault on your eyes isn't enough to overwhelm you, the scent will finish you off. It's incredible.

There are three walled gardens off this long walk, each walled to concentrate the aromas further. The Victorian Garden is circular, inviting you to explore different varieties in a contemplative spiral. The Lion Garden, named for a large sculpture at one end, is the most varied of the planting schemes with a mix of species alongside the headliners. The Renaissance Garden is the one I would most likely transplant to my own home, should I win lottery. A long, still pool runs from the main entrance to an Italian-style loggia. On either side of the water are aisles framed with undulating box hedges from which roses spill. A pergola runs down one side. Combined with the framing walls and the back of the loggia, it’s an exceptional stage for climbers. Here, as in the Long Garden, roses bloom at every level your eye rests upon, overwhelming both eyes and nose.

There are plenty of benches throughout for lingering appreciation. If you need more significant sustenance there is a lovely little café surrounded by more roses and staffed by locals who radiate pride in their garden. They serve simple country fair done well. Soup, sandwiches and cakes, all obviously handmade rather than from an industrial kitchen.

The purpose of these gardens is, of course, to sell roses, and this is one of the world's better examples of exiting through the gift shop. Austin’s greatest hits are organised by type in an enormous outdoor garden centre. I have bought many of these roses from garden centres and have been delighted, but the quality here is even better. I doubt that the “Boscobel” I purchased will ever look as good as it did in its pot at its birthplace. These gardens aren’t just special because of the roses, but because of the care and knowledge of the experts who tend them. Every spent bloom is dead-headed, soil beneath is turned gently, branches are pruned in the optimum spots and I’m sure every bit of feeding is done to its proper schedule. I must do better.

If you are making a long drive to get to David Austin’s, you may want to expand your day with a visit to a fascinating National Trust property that is only 20 minutes down the road on the outskirts of Wolverhampton. Wightwick Manor is probably the most beautiful of the small handful of Arts and Crafts houses on the heritage circuit. 

That it has few peers is probably down to a visceral hatred of Victorian art and architecture that ran through much of the 20th century. I admit many Victorian interiors can be gloomy and overwhelming but Arts and Crafts, embraced by industrialists who wanted to be seen as edgy, intellectual non-traditionalists, is different. The combination of William Morris, his colleagues in the decorative arts and the pre-Raphaelite painters brings a lightness of touch, a confidence with colour and a devotion to romance and comfort. My instinctive reaction in an Arts and Crafts house is to snuggle on a sofa with a great book. (To match the environment, probably something by Oscar Wilde.) Here, I could do so for a very long time.

Though Wightwick was built with all of the “mod cons” available in 1887 (electricity, central heating, proper bathrooms), it is meant to feel like a fairy tale bower. William Morris’s lush floral wallpaper surrounds you, and there are several original drawings from his tapestries.

His fabrics beckon you onto overstuffed chairs and sofas. Stained glass windows and de Morgan tiles around fireplaces send shards of jewel-toned light across rooms. One of the best collections of Pre-Raphaelite paintings in the country brings those fairytales to life on the walls. One of the unique elements of Wightwick is its large collection of female Pre-Raphaelite artists, and these days they really celebrate that part of the collection. On my visit the gallery in one of the outbuildings was dedicated to the little-known wife of William Morgan, Evelyn, who was an accomplished artist whose work inspired her husband’s pottery.

Outside, the house is all romantic gables, half timber and and mellow brickwork. Master craftsmen were as much at work here as inside, evident in carved animals and decorative bits that adorn the timbers. 

There are some pretty rose gardens here. Though they pale in comparison to David Austin’s.

The staff inside the house were both chattier, and more knowledgeable, than your usual National Trust volunteers. Maybe it’s the extra time they’ve had in lockdown, or maybe just a deep pride in this region that isn’t really on the tourist track. If you are anywhere near here, especially in rose season, it is worth a detour. Both these sites are jewels that deserve to be better known.

Hosta specialist softens loss of Hampton Court show

I should have been at the Hampton Court Flower Show this week. My venerable annual tradition always starts with a leisurely catch up over a champagne breakfast with my friends Alex and Philippa before we wander across the road to the world’s largest flower show, drink in the new trends and shop ‘til we drop. Then we rest, fortify with a restorative jug of Pimms, and keep shopping.

Not this year. Yet another annual milestone fell to the pandemic axe as 2020 moves towards being the year that never happened. We shared breakfast over a Zoom call, but it’s not quite the same.

Lockdown has been steadily loosening, however, and garden centres were some of the earliest businesses released from shackles. So this year I still took my flower show day off, but rather than visiting all the specialist vendors in one place I picked one of my favourite suppliers and went to them.

New Forest Hostas specialise in a plant that claims a soft spot in my heart. Also known as the plantain lily, these shade-loving, broad-leafed plants are native to northeast Asia, but the centre of modern hybridisation is the United States. They were common sights in the woodland gardens of the American Midwest, including my childhood home. One variety ... its name lost in time and its simple appearance dating from an age before showy hybrids ... has moved with my family through every house we’ve owned since my grandfather planted it in the early ‘50s. Taking divisions of the plants was the last thing I did before leaving my childhood home to its new owners. For 40 years there, my mother had fought an ongoing, usually unsuccessful, battle with the deer who would emerge from the trees behind our house to feast on the tender leaves. She was trying to mimic beneath her own oaks the winding, multi-variety beds that snaked through the Missouri botanical garden.

In England, my wars are with slugs and snails. Gardeners seeking an easy life often avoid hostas, given their popularity with multiple predators, but that would be a mistake. They grow in shady spots many other plants refuse. They come in a beguiling variety of leaf colours and patterns, in sizes from miniatures to single plants that demand several square meters.

Some hosta miniatures by my smaller pond

Though foliage is the main point of hostas, they do send up spikes of white, blue or purple blooms in late July and August. They’re great value for money, with the typical plant doubling in size every three to four years, allowing you to separate and plant out (or give away) the spares. While predators may leave the leaves holed or gnaw them to the ground, hostas are amongst the toughest of garden plants and difficult to kill. They flourish in the ground or in pots. A well-planned hosta bed can be a soothing study in green, from deepest blue-greens to pale yellowish shades, sparked with the occasional white. Every year breeders come up with new varieties to tempt gardeners like me.

My main hosta bed

My only criticism? They die back over the winter, leaving bare earth on view for several months. And, of course, the endless battles with the predators. My garden in England is walled, so I don’t have to worry about Bambi and friends. (Though to this day I still feel the victory of revenge whenever I eat venison.) Most people used to control slugs and snails with poisonous pellets, until we got smart to the fact that the frogs and birds who eat the pests were getting poisoned, too. Now gardeners debate their favourite organic defences, from rings of copper, stones or crushed egg shells around plants to garlic concentrate spray to beer traps to a regular dose of nematodes, a microscopic organism that likes to eat slug and snail eggs. Encouraging frogs, hedgehogs and birds into your garden helps. In my experience, growing hostas in pots produces the best results, but that hasn’t kept me from trying beds as well.

Hosta alley; my potted collection

New Forest Hostas is one of a handful of English hosta experts who show up at the big flower shows. Your average garden centre might have five or ten varieties, while these specialists will have more than 100, along with vast knowledge of what grows well where, disease resistance, legacy and speed-to-division. New Forest is a young contender compared to Suffolk’s Mickfield Hostas, who hold the national collection and have been in the specialist game for more than 20 years. But New Forest hails from my current home county of Hampshire and I’ve had a soft spot for them ever since I met one of the owners at a local plant fair and she talked me into what’s become my favourite hosta in my garden: Cathedral Window. (Top photo.)

New Forest Hostas impressive collection

They’re only open to the public on certain days and the shopping area is just one shaded poly tunnel with three aisles. But that’s more than enough for an addict. The first aisle is dedicated to their show plants ... champion specimens in pots ... and the other two a tidy supermarket-style array of plants for purchase arranged by name.  All in a Covid-safe one-way system with plenty of hand gel on offer, of course. I spent at least an hour pottering about in deep contentment. Without Alex and Philippa to restrain me (their usual role at Hampton Court when we get to the hosta stands) I had to police myself. I was there to try to identify two of my plants for which I’d lost the name and buy no more than three additions to my “hosta alley”. 

Mission almost accomplished. One of my missing IDs was “Geisha”, the other probably came from Mickfield and remains anonymous. I emerged with “Georgia Sweetheart”, an unusual yellow hue I don’t have anywhere in my collection, “Coloured Hulk”, a deep blue that’s likewise under-represented, and “Sting”, a white centre with multi-coloured green edges I couldn’t resist. I also learned that hosta like constrained roots, and I’ve probably been retarding their growth by putting them in pots that are too big for their current size. A flurry of re-planting followed my trip as I sunk pots within pots to create some squeeze.

Along the Lymington

New Forest Hostas is a little over an hour from my house and provided an excellent excuse to drive down to that eponymous area of ancient woodland. One excellent effect of the pandemic’s social limitations has been to remind me of what’s on my doorstep. Between the annual round of events and holidays that always start with a passport check, I’ve fallen out of the habit of sightseeing in my general area. The forest that was “new” in the 11th century when William II enclosed it as a hunting ground is now a charming hybrid of national park peppered with private properties, charming villages and hotels. It’s a popular place for picnics and walks. I didn’t pack my lunch but I did enjoy a spectacular walk in the woodland next to the Lymington River, a stretch so picturesque in its mossy, sun-dappled solitude you’d think Disney’s early animation artists had visited to sketch their backdrops for Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. (Any of the National Park car parks on the B3055 just to the east of The Pig restaurant and hotel will put you next to this path. Just park and walk into the woods with your back to the road.)

I miss normal life, but my garden and my local knowledge are improving with life’s current limitations.

Hampton Court "Show" to "Festival": What's in a name?

The world's largest flower show celebrated its 26th birthday with a rebrand. The Royal Horticultural Society's Hampton Court Flower Show became a "Garden Festival". Why? We were a bit skeptical.

Three marketing professionals make up this "we". We used to work together, love gardening and have been using Hampton Court as our annual reunion for a decade. We've done the RHS Chelsea Flower Show as well, either together or as individuals, but we've always loved the more laid-back, sprawling nature of Hampton Court. And, of course, the plant sales. There's no place better to find specialist varieties of everything and anything you might want to grow. It covers more than 34 acres, attracts more than 140,000 visitors per year and sells more plants per square mile than any other place or event in the UK.

One statistic in the RHS' media pack suggests a reason for the change: the average age of RHS flower show attendees is 55. Though 86% of them occupy the desirably affluent "ABC1" niche, that average age suggests a shrinking market. So the RHS has brought the British summer festival treatment to their blockbuster event, with more music, more shopping, more places to eat, drink and relax, adventure trails for children and a welcome to dogs on leads.

The only thing that's suffered is the show gardens. If that was your primary reason for coming to

Hampton Court, you're going to be disappointed. The "Festival" features fewer gardens; the event map implies there are loads, but many shown as gardens turn out to be displays in front of grower's stands. The sponsored and judged gardens were, on the whole, less impressive than years past. The message seems to be that if you want display gardens, go to Chelsea. Hampton Court is now about something else.

And that something is a chilled, garden-themed day of R&R. In many ways, the transformation was subtle. The layout of the show ground is essentially the same, the floral marquee remains unchanged and many vendors are in the same spots from which you've been buying from them for years. But taken together the RHS has created a very different event in just one year's transformation. Other than a few pinch points for crowds that they need to resolve (the rose marquee in particular was a nightmare), it was beautifully produced and appeared wildly successful.

The most obvious change is the music.

Music has been a part of the flower shows but it was always a bit of entertainment thrown on while you paused, exhausted, to re-charge your batteries. At both Chelsea and Hampton Court, the entertainment area was often the only place you could find to sit down. There are now four stages with musical entertainment at Hampton Court, and these acts aren't an afterthought. They're fantastic. We heard folky, acoustic guitar near the Floral Marquee. Energising pop on a floating stage in the
canal that divides the show in two. Classical guitar at another venue in the very heart of the show, next to a cocktail-shaking pop-up van, a face-painting salon and an art installation where you walked down a tunnel beneath videos of oversized blooms going through their life cycle in time-lapsed glory. A covered amphitheatre at the back, near the rose festival, appeared the biggest of all but was taking a break as we wandered by. There is even now a pianist entertaining shoppers in the craft marquee (always a magnificent spot to get started on your Christmas shopping).

All of these venues are surrounded by a much-welcomed increase in food and drink vendors and places to sit down. For the first time ever, we found chairs every time we wanted a break, and never waited in an excessive queue to quench hunger or thirst. Someone has clearly worked to increase the variety, too. In addition to the inevitable hog roasts, burgers and fish and chips, there were exotic wraps, cocktail-flavoured ice pops, smoked salmon bagels and, for those who planned ahead, the ability to pick up a Fortnum & Mason's picnic hamper to consume while listening to the acts on the floating stage. There's even a large, multi-point bottle refill station sponsored by Thames Water that ... for the first time in my event-going experience in the UK ... offered plentiful water without ridiculous queues.

For the first time, we agreed, Hampton Court has become something our gardening-ambivalent partners might enjoy.

I suspect that parents were thinking the same thing about their children. Fantastical figures on stilts now wander the show. There are adventure trails full of instagrammable photo stations. (We had to restrain ourselves from taking a photo with the Very Hungry Caterpillar. There's been some sort of gardening-related contest for schools at Hampton Court for years, but this year's bug hotel challenge was not only just as good as many of the "professional" displays but located at the very centre of the show.

I'm less sure about the appeal for dog owners. Hampton Court is still very crowded, and most humans find it a challenge to avoid getting stepped on or rolled over by the ubiquitous plant trolleys containing shoppers' treasures. My dogs wouldn't do well; Datchet and Bruno, at least, are best left at home.

All these changes have been implemented by a team with a sharp sense of design. The festival has a colour scheme (orange, slate blue, plum and an avocado green) carried through the grounds in bunting, pennants and stripped deck chairs. The RHS has also installed its own pop-up gardens throughout to add to the look of the place.

Wisely, they haven't tinkered with the one thing that's always been Hampton Court's USP: plant sales.  In fact, there seem to be even more nurseries than before, with both a packed Floral Marquee and plant "villages" at both of the main show entrances. This is the place for people on specific horticultural missions, as I was this year. My main hosta bed had two gaps that needed filling. (Thank you, New Forest Hostas, for Morning Star and Christmas Island.) And I had a new, small bed to plant from scratch. Wanting something different from the rest of my garden, I had decided on a mix of grasses swaying around an anchor rose, all in shades of bronzes, oranges and deep reds ... a distinct contrast to my mostly purple and pink garden. Mission accomplished, with the striking Peter Beales rose La Villa Cotta and a bunch of exotic looking grasses. (New plants in their new bed below. Not yet a show garden!)

Our opinion was unanimous: the Garden Festival is a change for the better. We didn't mind the de-emphasis on show gardens. (And there were enough there to maintain interest, particularly the people's choice award-winning Cancer Research plot.) We loved the more relaxed pace and the expanded scope. The big question now: do we let the boys in on some of our fun when our 11th annual outing rolls around? Stay tuned...