Hurrah: we win an award.
November 27, 2015 § 9 Comments
When I was in art college studying woven textiles, I won the Lillias Mitchell award for hand-spinning. I got a nice letter and a small cheque. That was decades ago, and I never won anything after that except for two raffle prizes.
Until yesterday.
Yesterday, my book, The Irish Garden, won the Inspirational Book of the Year award at the Garden Media Guild Awards in London. You could say (and I have, a bit) that they are the BAFTAs (or the Oscars) of the gardening world. My husband, Jonathan Hession, took the photographs, so it is very much our book, not just mine. We worked on it for over four years. It was so all-pervasive that it was almost like having a small person living with us, with all the attendant joys and difficulties.
During this period, our publisher, Frances Lincoln, showed a fair amount of forbearance, especially my editor, Jo Christian, who now runs her own independent publishing house, Pimpernel Press. The book designer Anne Wilson created a thoughtful and beautiful design. If you ever need a garden book designer — she’s the best.
We didn’t go to the awards ceremony, so we learned by email that we’d won. We had a couple of glasses of Prosecco to celebrate. The dog vomited. We went to bed at 2am. It was a grand night.
Here is what the judges said:
“A superbly researched book that reads as wonderfully as it looks. Sumptuous, illustrative photography illustrates copy that takes you by the hand to enjoy a journey through the history, styles, variety, atmosphere and characters of a huge range of valuable Irish Gardens. There is much to admire and inspire in the pages of the book, and its relevance is so important to any gardener’s library. Congratulations to the husband and wife writer/photographer team Jane Powers and Jonathan Hession, their passion for the gardens in the area they live is alive and obvious in every page.”
Finalists
Victoria Clarke The Gardener’s Garden
Heidi Howcroft & Marianne Majerus Garden Design: A Book of Ideas
Carol Klein Making a Garden: Successful gardening by nature’s rules
James Wong Grow For Flavour
One Bean Row 
I am soooooo delighted for you both! Hearty congratulations, and warmest regards to you both, and to the dog who vomited. x Koraley
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Congratulations and well-deserved, Jane. I have the book right here by my chair and am always dipping in and taking inspiration. Barbara
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Congratulations Jane and Jonathan pity you could not be there but sounds like a good evening all the same!! I’ve heard of getting sick with excitement but your poor doggie certainly showed his….excitement that is!
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I didn’t know you won the Lilias Mitchell – a woman of many parts. These days it has morphed into an RDS award for “weaver, student or postgraduate, enlarging his or her vision by research into spinning, dyeing or weaving, submitting both a written thesis and a sample of work”. She was an amazing woman – as are you 🙂
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I didn’t know that Miss Mitchell’s prize still existed. I won it for a project on vegetable dyes, and a couple of handspun and woven items. I did enjoy spinning for a while, but I gave my wheel away some years ago.
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An award so very well deserved. I am delighted for you both.
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Well done and well deserved 🙂 Congratulations
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Thank you, Geoff 🙂
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As your book with its beautiful pictures has inspired us to want a holiday touring Irish gardens it is definitely a very worthy winner of this award. You should get an award from Irish tourist board too!
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