Who am I?

After a career in teaching and  ending up as a head teacher in inner London, I took early [OK very early] retirement and decided to go back into education full time on my own account.   I did a four  year diploma course in Garden History and that led on to an MA in Historical Research at Birkbeck College, University of London in 1999.   I   enjoyed academia so much I  went straight on to do a  PhD at Birkbeck on The Gardens and Gardeners of Later Stuart London which I was awarded in 2005.  

I am a trustee of The Gardens Trust, the national campaigning body for the protection and support of our historic parks, gardens and designed landscapes.  I chair their education and training committee and write a weekly blog for them which you can find at thegardenstrust.blog

From 2011-2022 I was one of the  convenors of the History of Gardens and Landscapes seminar at the Institute of Historical Research  at the University of London. For their current programme see … http://www.history.ac.uk/events/seminars/121 

From 2012 to 2016 I was also a trustee of Parks & Gardens UK which is the main on-line source of  information about historic parks and gardens in the country.  For more info take a look at … www.parksandgardens.org 

I am now Course Director for an MA in Garden History and an honorary Senior Research Fellow at the University of Buckingham and am also able to supervise PhD students from this autumn!