I met up with a gang of my fellow garden design graduates at the Chelsea Physic Garden yesterday.

After a witty and info-packed tour led a by our guide Anne, I wandered off into some of the more unkempt corners of the 4-acre walled site. At every turn I could feel my childhood excitement for exotic plants stirring to life…

Don’t get me wrong, I love meadow planting in the right landscape. But because our climate is changing, we need to adapt our planting palettes. It’s an opportunity to embrace added variety and texture. Especially in London and dryer corners of the south and west.

Meanwhile, I'm musing a plant-spotting trip to the Azores, or perhaps Chile, or China...

Azorina vidallii, Azores bellflower. Endangered with less than 1000 plants growing in the Azores today