Celebrity Journalist Angela Sara West unearths top gardening expert Huw Richards’ exclusive advice for readers of Improve, dishes the dirt on the leading YouTuber’s top tips for improving our green spaces and creating garden kitchens to serve us up a sensational sustainable lifestyle, and digs up Huw’s guidance on getting our gardens set for those summer socials and his secrets for creating a garden fit for a King!

Looking to spruce up your outdoor space? Yearning to become a more modern sustainable gardener and feed on what you sow and grow? 

As our great garden maintenance and makeover season is now well underway, whether you’re improving your green space to make it more inspiring, summer party ready, or simply to relax in, now is the time to get as busy as our buzzy bees… 

Sustainable Kitchen Gardening

It’s well worth investing in your green spaces for both the physical and mental health benefits, too. Great for fresh air and activity, our outdoor spaces also lend themselves perfectly to learning new skills. 

And with the growing trend for kitchen gardening for a healthier, greener life, too, look no further than the UK’s leading gardening Youtuber, who will show you the ropes to becoming the best gardener you can be.

“Two thirds of Brits will be gardening or tending plants this season,” reveals gardening guru Huw Richards. “Which is great, as it shows that gardening is still in the veins of we Brits, and firmly rooted in our culture.”

What’s more, many of us are looking to become more modern gardeners, moving to a much more sustainable farm-to-fork lifestyle by creating homegrown produce in an organic way. And Huw’s here on hand to educate and empower people to reap the rewards of what we sow. 

“There’s nothing quite like growing your own food, plants, herbs, or anything that brings you joy,” explains the expert gardener, author and leading voice in permaculture and kitchen gardens.

“Kitchen gardens focus on bringing flavour to your kitchen table…,” he says. “Not only the annuals, but also fruit, herbs and ornamental flowers, making it look as appealing as it tastes!”

The top Youtuber and influencer forks out fantastic advice for those on a new gardening journey or maintenance mission, whether you’re starting from scratch as an amateur or a competent pro. “With an unprecedented surge of interest in gardening since we were forced to spend more time at home, gardening continues to be a popular pastime post pandemic, with the intention of leading a more sustainable lifestyle by eating what our green spaces yield high on Brits’ agendas,” says Huw.  

Over half of Brits will be focusing on ‘maintaining’ their garden this year, and nearly 40% of us will plant ‘low-cost’ plants and flowers, according to YouGov research for Readly digital magazine and newspaper app.

Create a Great Garden Kitchen

Following the unprecedented wet weather and with warm weekends finally on our horizon, May and June offer a great opportunity to get stuck in with sowing to reap some seriously tasty rewards. Get down to some serious home growing with Huw’s simple step-by-step guides to building and planting raised beds and more!

May’s the most intense sowing month, and Huw has advice aplenty for planting, composting, nurturing and maintenance for the very best yield. Complete beginner? Not only can gardening unleash creativity, but you’ll also learn a new skill along the way!

Low-cost Planting 

Nearly half of us plan to grow our own this season, and with the cost of living high on the agenda this year, planting low-cost flowers and plants and growing fruits and vegetables in kitchen gardens is a priority. 

“Salads are, perhaps, the best money-saving crop out there,” says Huw. “They are incredibly productive on a small scale and can be continuously picked and eaten,” he explains. If flavour is important, then planting a diverse herb garden is one of the simplest ways to greatly influence the taste of what you create in the kitchen.”

Strawberries, tomatoes and potatoes are the top three fruits and vegetables people will be growing this year, and Huw is committed to helping us grow an abundance of amazing food, predominately through no-dig vegetable growing, with his channel, which also covers herbs, fruit and edible flowers, plus how to create a thriving growing space using organic and permaculture principles. 

“Most of my sowing is done during the month of May. It’s a very exciting time!” Huw reveals. “It’s now too late to sow some crops, including tomatoes, but you can buy the actual plants from a local garden centre. My personal favourites to grow are peas, which can even work on a windowsill!”

Top of the Crops

Along with recently teaming up with Readly to offer his top tips aplenty, the top YouTuber has also collaborated with award-winning DirectPlants, creating ‘The Huw Richards Potted Soft Fruit Bush and Plant Collection’. 

According to the Readly App, the top 10 fruits and vegetables UK we’re growing at home this year are:

• Strawberries
• Tomatoes
• Potatoes
• Raspberries
• Apples
• Cucumber
• Blueberries
• Rhubarb
• Runner beans
• Blackberries

Get Garden ‘Appy!

Whether you’re a budding gardener or seasoned pro, reading Huw’s advice on the Readly app will get us all garden ‘appy and ready to rock.

“If you’re new to growing this season, or taking it to the next level, then now is the perfect time to get going!” he says. “And the Readly app is a good place to start, with lots of great gardening magazines to harvest your knowledge. Gardening is SO visual, and Readly currently offers free reading ‘til the end of May!”

Brimming with inspiration for the beginner, right through to teaching advanced techniques to green-fingered pros, whether you’re a window box gardener, allotment owner, or are lucky enough to enjoy acres of land, the Readly app assists with articles for every type of gardener, with thousands of titles available as part of the unlimited digital reading subscription. 

The app will also help you get party-ready and gain knowledge and inspiration for planting fruit and veg to cultivate more self-sufficient and sustainable lives.

Crowning Glory – Meeting The King!

Huw has twice met our nature-loving, recently crowned King Charles III. “The King is a MASSIVE fan of nature and a committed environmentalist, and is particularly passionate about are wildflowers and meadows,” says Huw, who is a huge fan himself of making spaces for nature and ‘No Mow May’, to encourage wildflowers to bloom and insects to flourish.

As a young boy, Huw was proud to meet our new King. “There was a Harmony conference being hosted at my school, and I’d set up a little school garden, so I showed him around the veg beds and the plastic-bottle greenhouse we’d made. I then opened the conference at which he then spoke. I subsequently met him again at a mini conference with just 40 people in Dumfries in Scotland. It was kind of surreal!”

Wildflowering For Insects + Community Projects 

Huw has advice a-go-go on how to make your garden a wildflower haven whilst maintaining its beauty. “You can sow your own wildflower seed mix and, if you want to keep it tidy, you can mow a nice, curved pathway through it or have a border.”

Pollinator-friendly plants can also help our busy buzzy bees. “Do things that are nice for nature, suggests the YouTuber. “For example, you could add a solitary bee hotel, which is amazing for British wildlife.”

In recent years, Huw has shifted his focus to an exciting new growing project in mid Wales. Dan Yr Onnen (which means “under the Ash tree” in Welsh) is an ambitious undertaking, reflecting hardy Huw’s passion for sustainable agriculture and his desire to make a positive impact on the local community.

A Green Oasis…

But back to our own back and front gardens and, alongside sowing the seeds for summer success, other gardening priorities on our gardening agendas this year include planting bushes or trees, creating a green oasis in the home and perfecting the design and look of outdoor gardens, while a third of us will focus efforts on getting our gardens in shape for the summer ahead of hosting our (hopefully sun-drenched!) seasonal socials. 

Nine in 10 people will garden outdoor green spaces this season, whilst one in three will be planting indoors and 6% will work on balcony boxes or allotments. For those with little or no green space, Huw and the Readly app also spill the beans on how to bring the outdoors in, planting indoors and on small balconies to lead more self-sufficient and sustainable lives.

Huw’s recommendation for tackling a big project for the summer season is to start small. “If you haven’t yet done so, create a little seating area, even if it’s just a nook. It’s just a nice space to sit, to be outside and enjoy some sun, and maybe have a barbecue.”

“A garden is a bridge to nature,” he says. “And we all come from nature, at the end of the day, and being in the garden really connects us with the seasons.”

Get Garden Party Ready!

Preparing gardens so they are ‘party ready’ is also top of our agendas. Huw’s no.1 tip for prepping for our social socials? 

“Plant a small bed, border or large container with fragrant herbs, such as fennel, lemon verbena and mint, to use as garnish and flavour summer drinks, and then enjoy it in greater quantities for years to come.”

Giving Our Gardens The ‘Wow’ Factor 

With outside dining now big in the UK (despite our unpredictable weather!) the down-to-earth digger divulges the Readly app offers advice for creating and zoning dedicated outdoor kitchen and living areas for summer socials, play, growing vegetables, edible ornamentals, herbs and more, as well as the lowdown on the latest tools, ‘must-have’ summer garden products and the designs that should be on our garden radars right now. 

Weeding out the old for the new to get our gardens set for the summer season and ‘party’ ready, the gardening guru also earths up invaluable inspiring ways to improve our outside spaces to make them more motiving and stylish on a low budget, creating a luxe-looking green oasis for less. 

“I’m so excited for everyone on their gardening journey!” he says. 

The Secret Garden

The key to creating a GREAT garden? “I think a good garden is a place that you’re always craving to be in,” reveals Huw. “Pick things that really make your heart sing… The secret is to create a space where you want to spend as much time as possible. So, think about little things that will make it a really nice place to be – the ‘pull’ factors to get you out there!”

Huw’s Exclusive Top Kitchen Garden Tips for Improve:

1. Grow what you enjoy growing and eating! You want to be filled with the anticipation of being able to eat some of your favourite foods – grown yourself!

2. Focus on getting your first harvest under your belt as quickly as possible. Pea shoots are perfect for this – ready for eating in as little as 2-3 weeks from sowing. As soon as you experience your first-ever taste of homegrown produce, you will be confident and motivated to grow as much as possible!

3. There is no such thing as too much homemade compost. You can’t have a thriving garden without it; the more compost you can make, the more money you can save.

4. Plant up pots and containers with edible flowers, such as nasturtium, calendula, and borage, which are all fantastic for encouraging pollinators to pollinate your crops and add splashes of colour throughout.

5. Grow in raised beds with sides. You have no encroaching grass to deal with, it splits the garden into manageable sections, and there is less bending down. Don’t go wider than 4ft 1.2m, so you can reach the middle from both sides.

6. Finally, head to your local allotment – gardeners love sharing advice!

Huw’s YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/c/HuwRichards/videos

Follow Huw on Insta: @huwsgarden

Readly is giving unlimited reading to over 7,000 digital magazines and newspapers, including top gardening titles, this season with a special offer until 31st May 2023. Visit www.readly.com/gardening