Garden art and bread

I had a lovely comment from an anonymous person (thank you) on my last posting who offered a memory of being in Chesters Walled Garden amongst its amazing and tame wildlife. Memories of the garden live on in all sorts of different ways and from now until nearly Christmas you can see Kim Lewis's quite wonderful prints in the lovely setting of Allendale Bakery and Cafe. It's not really as if you need an excuse to visit this warm, cosy cafe on a winter's day with its fresh baking smells, bowls of home made soup and the best scones I have ever tasted. Kim's work looks so right in this setting and is being much admired.

The prints show 12 iconic plants from the walled garden, plants I chose to represent each of the four walls. I wrote 50 words of text to go with each (keeping to few words is harder than writing lots...) and we talked together about the plants natures, what they FELT like, what they meant to me, and Kim has got all this miraculously into her linocuts. This is the second airing for the exhibition after being seen at the Queen's Hall Arts centre in Hexham this summer. In addition to the prints of Chesters (which Kim entitled 'Sanctuary') she is showing a set of prints of lilies also very beautiful. You can read about the Bakery and its breadmaking courses at www.allendalebakery.com - there is lots of parking or you can park in the marketplace in Allendale and walk for one mile along the river to get to it. The footpath goes past the hollow into an old mine working where a stream issues out of the stone entrance. A great thing to do on a winter day.