Bunny Guinness is a leading garden designer who has run her own landscape design practice since 1987. A prominent figure in the gardening media, she is a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4’s ’Gardeners’ Question Time’ and has appeared on many television shows such as ’Guinness in the Garden’, ’Small Town Gardens’, ’Carol Vordermann’s Better Gardens’ and ’The Great Garden Challenge’. She has also hosted London’s Chelsea Flower Show for the BBC. In addition to writing a weekly column for the Sunday Telegraph, she has contributed articles to The Garden, House and Garden, The English Garden, Country Life and many others. Bunny is the author of several books including the bestselling Family Gardens. The recipient of six gold medals for her Chelsea Flower Show gardens, she takes on private garden design commissions all over the world.
You've just written a book, Garden Your Way to Health and Fitness, but isn't gardening the traditional route to a bad back?
Yes, all my relatives who work in horticulture suffer from bad backs, shoulders, knees, everything you can think of.
So how does the book help?
People think that gardening is easy work and don't prepare. But it's like any other exercise; you need to stretch before and after, make sure your technique is good and use the correct tools. We combine all that in the book with exercises you can do in the garden.
We?
The book is co-authored by a physiotherapist, Jacqueline Knox. She taught me how to stretch properly and balance my body, for example by switching which hand I use to do jobs around the garden.
What's best for burning calories?
Chopping wood. Really swinging an axe and keeping up the momentum burns 1,100 calories an hour, and it uses all your core muscles.
And if you don't have a forest?
Just spending an hour in the garden mowing the lawn is a great exercise for burning fat because it is constant and light. Plus, once you start gardening you get carried away and barely notice how hard you're working.
Other ways to keep fit?
Most of my day as a garden designer and landscape architect is spent in the office or driving to clients, so in my free time I do quite a lot of exercise. I do Pilates at least 15 minutes a day and I have a cross-training machine that I try to use half an hour to an hour at least four times a week.
Any gardening-related injuries?
Nothing serious, apart from that bad back occasionally. About 20 years ago when I was doing the Chelsea Flower Show I was lugging a bag of logs under one arm and a sack of coal under the other and I felt a twinge. The next morning when I got up I blacked out. My spine had gone into spasm.
How did you get it fixed?
I went to an osteopath, but that didn't work. It was heavy massage and three or four weeks of intensive physiotherapy that sorted it.
Into complementary therapies?
To an extent. When I'm on Gardeners' Question Time, on Radio 4, I get nervous so I put a little lavender up my sleeve and have a sniff every now and then. It's very relaxing. A client in Japan also gives me advice on alternative medicines.
Ever tried Dragon's Blood (amber resin)?
The labels are in Japanese, so who knows! But I think green tea is very good; it feels purifying. I also think that the Japanese approach to food is very healthy.
Raw fish and rice?
Not so much that as the small courses and the variety.
Do you watch your weight?
I watch what I eat and wouldn't eat masses of chocolate, but my weight has never been a big issue. I lost a few pounds while writing the book though, as I was more focused on exercise. And I eat plenty of fruit and vegetables.
Home-grown?
Definitely. My garden is full of vegetables.
Organic?
No. The garden is quite big and I have only one day a week to give to it, so going organic isn't an option. But I try to keep things as natural as possible.
Any vices?
I'm sure I have loads... I'm quite dogmatic.
A perfectionist? Surely a good thing in the garden?
Not necessarily in gardening or in life. I can be too single-minded, so focused on what's right in front of me that I miss out on what's going on around me.
Is gardening good for the soul?
Researchers at Loughborough University found that if you're in hospital looking out on to a garden you will get better more quickly than if you look out onto a wall or car park. I find that if I walk through the garden or greenhouse before I go to work, I can think more clearly.
Is gardening your religion?
I don't really have a religion. I just believe in good and evil. But I like the Quaker ethos.
Is it the bonnets?
It's what they strive for. They don't like consumerism and they seem to contribute more to society, seeing the good in every person.
I have heard that gardeners live longer than average. Why do you think that is?
I think it's partly that you're moving all the time so you're fitter. And when you plant things like trees, you want to stick around to see the results.
Is gardening better than sex?
I couldn't do without either. Enjoy both, I say, but maybe not at the same time. You might get nettle rash.
-- Times Online, 10 May 2008
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