URBAN GARDENING SPRINGS UP AT SELFRIDGES WITH `GROW!`

URBAN GARDENING
SPRINGS UP AT
SELFRIDGES WITH
‘GROW!’
Seedbom grenades, £15 for pack of four
When: 01 April 2011 until the end of the month
Where: Selfridges Concept Store, located in the Wonder Room
Selfridges marks the beginning of Spring by launching Grow! – a
new radical look at and playful celebration of urban gardening, for
enthusiasts and beginners alike.
Oxford Street windows featuring installations by Richard Reynolds. Photography by Andrew Meredith
Grow!, which is housed in Selfridges’ Concept Store, the London
store’s destination for the most unexpected temporary shops
and concept installations, demonstrates that living in cities
surrounded by concrete, steel and glass can be the perfect
environment to make nature grow.
BOSKKE Skyplanters,
from £22.50
Grow! at Selfridges presents a host of innovative products and
solutions, some of which were created exclusively for Selfridges.
They were all selected to instill a sense of possibility that, even in
the tiniest apartment, it can be easy and hugely rewarding to
reconnect with nature through gardening.
GUERILLA GARDENING
Grow! features highly creative underground activist gardening
brands, including SeedBom’s collection of seed-packed
grenade-shaped soil-filled wraps, designed to be thrown at
even the most barren cityscapes to create areas of life within them.
The Thoughtful Gardener
twine in a can, £8.95
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Grow! makes full use of the Wonder Windows
(five of the store’s largest windows surrounding
the Concept Store) by displaying an installation
by Richard Reynolds, the world’s foremost
expert in guerrilla gardening – a movement
which puts nature-less urban spaces at the
core of its concern, enabling urbanites to
garden without boundaries on sites such as
inner-city roundabouts and lifeless concrete
pavements. Richard’s window installations
showcase impressive gardening devices created
by guerrilla gardeners from around the world,
as well as Richard’s beautiful photographs
documenting the areas he and his team have helped
to beautify through their work.
Grow also presents a number of product lines
manufactured by Richard Reynold’s followers
including lavender pillows, created using
lavender planted and harvested in South
London as part of the guerrilla gardening
movement. Find out more about Richard
Reynolds at www.guerillagardening.org
Seedbom grenades in use
Grow! compliments a store-wide window
scheme of nature-inspired fantasy scenes which
showcase the best of Selfridges’ Spring fashion
and Homewear.
Linda Hewson, Selfridges Head of Creative,
explains the project: “Our aim with Grow! is to
inspire people to embrace unexpected ways to
garden – even in the absence of a garden! Be it
using a gardening grenade or a hanging potted
plant with next to no maintenance involved in
nurturing it, I think people will be surprised at how
easy it can be to be green-fingered when living in
the City.”
An entirely different exploration of botanical life
comes in the form of Shamanic Landscaping, a
new exclusive work by horticultural installation artist
Tony Heywood. This outstanding work is part of Tony
Heywood’s ongoing ‘Glamourlands’ series which
vividly and often surreally express the contrasting
beauty of British nature. Taking landscaping to
new heights, these beautifully created large scale
sculptural works are inspired by a shamanic spiritual
process that allows the artist to connect more
deeply with nature and conjure up visions which he
then realises in the wild. Shamanic Landscaping,
exclusive to Selfridges, will unsually be miniature
pieces, bonsai-style, to fit the Grow! concept of
springing nature even in the most confined of
spaces.
‘Glamourlands’ by Tony Heywood
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HAUTE-ICULTURE
Style enthusiasts who may be new to the world
of gardening are catered for in the form of chic
accessories and tools – designed for those who refuse
to be a wallflower! Icelandic jewellery brand HAF
by Hafsteinn Juliusson presents a quirky collection
of handcrafted Growing Jewellery, exclusive to
Selfridges in the UK, which fuses nature with fashion
in a range of playful silver pieces housing miniature
garden replicas.
HAF Growing Jewellery
silver ring, £90
Az&Mut Cavalier
plant pots, £80 each
SPACE-SAVING SOLUTIONS
Innovative solutions to saving space in smaller homes
begin with BOSKKE Skyplanters – gravity-defying
designs wherein potted plants grow upside-down
whilst suspended. A unique irrigation system ensures
that water poured from above into the pot is fed
directly into the plant’s roots, with no risk of it dripping
through. French design duo az&mut, who specialise in
innovative use of local materials, produce gorgeous
handmade plant pots with a central groove enabling
them to sit upon staircase railings or balconies.
Celia Birtwell and V&A
gardening kits, £24
But Grow! is also about the traditional – there is no
reason why essential tools can’t be pretty too. With a
nod to Spring’s love for floral prints and offering stylish
solutions to gardening, Celia Birtwell and V&A’s
Gardening Kits make this possible.
ABOUT SELFRIDGES
The business was founded by American entrepreneur Harry Gordon Selfridge in 1909 as an example
of the first modern department store. Gordon Selfridge ran the store himself until he retired in 1940.
After several ownerships the company was de-merged from the Sears Group in 1998 and floated on
the London Stock Exchange. In 2003 W. Galen Weston purchased Selfridges and under his ownership
Selfridges has become a UK destination for fashion and luxury. In June 2010 Selfridges was named
Best Department Store in the World by the IGDS (Intercontinental Group of Department Stores) and
the IADS (International Association of Department Stores). Selfridges has 6,400 employees with four
stores in London, Birmingham and Manchester (Trafford Centre, Exchange Square). For more
information visit selfridges.com.
Contact Details
For further information and images, please contact:
Bruno Barba
Selfridges Brand PR Manager
T +44 (0) 20 7318 3204
E [email protected]
Sophie Jewes
Selfridges Brand PR Assistant
T +44 (0) 20 7318 3987
E [email protected]
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