Suzi McLaughlin is ‘growing’ a unique display made entirely of paper. Alison Jones spoke to her.
The raw materials for Suzi McLaughlin’s English country garden might have been grown outdoors, but the end product is for indoor display only.
Although it is one of the 25 show gardens at the BBC Gardeners’ World Live Show, it will be safely tucked away inside the halls at the NEC rather than in the open alongside the rest.
This is because everything, from the brightly coloured blooms to the fluttering butterflies, will be made of paper.
Suzi, who lives in Banbury, was invited to take part by the Royal Horticultural Society after they had seen her work on display in Manchester.
“I think they were thinking of James May’s plasticine garden and how it attracted a lot of press and publicity for the Chelsea show and they wanted something similar for Gardeners’ World,” she said.
Suzi, 27, had already created a garden from paper for her degree show when she graduated from Birmingham University.
“I did a paper and origami vertical garden. We’d had a briefing from a trend prediction company and they were saying how paper, in all kinds of tropical colours, was a big trend. So the idea came from that initially and I got a brilliant response.
“I had what looked likes steps coming down from the wall with all this paper foliage kind of cascading down.
“I just wanted to bring the outside inside and create a tranquil environment indoors.”
She was studying textile design at Birmingham where the students were encouraged to experiment using paper before they went on to work with more expensive fabrics.
“I actually enjoyed using the paper more than I did the fabrics,” she said.
“I always loved doing origami when I was younger. I learnt from books and from demonstrations on YouTube and just experimenting. I never thought I could really use it though. I thought it had to be fabric if you were doing textiles or fashion design.
"But now the use of paper is becoming really popular in the fashion industry. I have seen paper dresses and paper jewellery.”
Working with such delicate material does carry its risks.
