Modern heroes of horticulture - Jamie Langlands
For some garden designers, the journey begins with plants. For Jamie Langlands, it began with art.
Growing up in Dorset, surrounded by the wild cliffs of the Jurassic Coast, rolling farmland and characterful villages, Jamie developed an early fascination with landscape. He went on to study Fine Art at Bournemouth Arts Institute, where landscapes, flowers and botanical forms increasingly found their way into his work. It was an artistic beginning that would eventually lead him somewhere he hadn't necessarily expected: garden design.
Today, Jamie is an award-winning designer, founder of Langlands Studio and a familiar name at RHS shows. But underneath the accolades, the artist is still very much there.
From canvas to garden
After studying Fine Art, garden design was suggested to Jamie as a possible career path. There was just one slight problem: by his own admission, he didn't know an enormous amount about plants. So, he went away and learned. Jamie trained in horticulture at Kingston Maurward College, combining practical plant knowledge with the understanding of form, composition and atmosphere he had already developed through art. It proved to be a powerful combination.
Rather than abandoning his artistic training for horticulture, Jamie brought the two disciplines together. Even today, his Fine Art background can be seen in the way he approaches gardens – understanding composition, rhythm and atmosphere, while combining them with practical horticultural knowledge. And those Dorset roots never disappeared either. The landscapes of the Jurassic Coast continue to influence his work, providing an emotional connection to place that has helped shape his creative identity.
Designing with nature, not against it
Spend time looking at Jamie's gardens and there is another thread that quickly becomes apparent: nature is allowed to have a say. His planting is often loose, layered and naturalistic. Rather than attempting to control every inch of a garden, his work embraces the way plants interact, change and settle into a landscape. It is an approach that feels increasingly relevant. His gardens can be carefully composed without feeling over-designed, balancing structure and atmosphere with planting that supports wildlife and evolves naturally through the seasons.
For Jamie, a successful garden isn't something imposed upon its surroundings. It should respond to its setting, its architecture and, importantly, the people who live there.
Learning through show gardens
RHS shows have played an important role in Jamie's career and, rather fittingly, his journey through them has been one of progression. His first RHS Malvern Spring Festival garden, The Low Line, arrived in 2016 and earned a Silver Medal. It offered an early glimpse of the design language that would continue to develop throughout his career. He returned to Malvern in 2022 with A Peaceful Escape, earning Silver-Gilt, before coming back a year later with the garden that would become a defining moment.
The Wildlife Trusts: Wilder Spaces was designed to demonstrate that wildlife-friendly gardening can go far beyond simply adding a few pollinator plants. Habitat was incorporated into the very structure of the garden, with reclaimed and repurposed materials, untreated timber, native planting, water, bog areas and a living-roof pavilion. The result was extraordinary.
The garden received an RHS Gold Medal, Best Show Garden, Best Construction and the People's Choice Award – four accolades for one garden and a major milestone in Jamie's career. But perhaps more important than the medals was the message behind it: beautiful, considered garden design and biodiversity don't need to compete. They can strengthen one another.
From Malvern to Chelsea
Jamie's show career continued to grow. In 2024 he created The Secret Escape feature garden at RHS Malvern and was involved with the David Harber Garden at RHS Chelsea Flower Show, which received a Five Star Award. These achievements sit alongside Gold Awards at Blenheim Palace Flower Show in 2016, 2019 and 2021, Best in Show there in 2016 and 2019, and a People's Choice Award at BBC Gardeners' World Live in 2017.
Away from the showground, Jamie now leads Langlands Studio from Oxfordshire, designing everything from intimate courtyards to expansive country gardens. The scale may change, but the principles remain remarkably consistent: an artist's eye, horticultural knowledge and respect for the landscape already there.
Coming full circle
A decade on from his first RHS Malvern garden, Jamie's relationship with the show has entered another interesting chapter. He has returned to RHS Malvern not simply as a designer, but as an RHS Malvern Mentor, sharing his experience and helping encourage those following in his footsteps. There is something rather lovely about that progression. The designer who arrived with his first Silver Medal-winning garden in 2016 has gone on to achieve RHS Gold and Best Show Garden, work at Chelsea and establish a successful design studio – and is now able to pass some of those lessons on to the next generation.
His creativity continues too. For the inaugural RHS Badminton Flower Show in 2026, Jamie created A Garden in Pieces – an installation formed from three open metal cubes, each representing fragments of a domestic garden. Planting, water, shelter and habitat demonstrate how individual gardens can become part of something much larger. One garden might seem insignificant. Connected with thousands of others, it can become part of a vital network for wildlife. In many ways, it feels like a natural continuation of the thinking behind Wilder Spaces – finding ways for strong garden design and nature to coexist.
