With the mission of starting a national conversation around mental illness, Janssen in partnership with leading mental health organisations Aware and See Change, present Grounded – Growing Conversations Around Mental Illness.

The central theme of the garden is how a conversation can be the first step on the journey of recovery. The stigma related to mental illness can result in a delay in reaching out for support. By educating ourselves on mental illness and the recovery process, we can break down this stigma, ultimately leading to a more open and positive environment for those living with or affected by mental illness.

Grounded is designed by landscape architect Maeve O’Neill who has created a space that welcomes both group and individual conversation in a setting that reflects the varied nature of mental illness. It incorporates ideas and drawings that were conceived through a series of hands-on workshops with people living with or affected by mental illness.

The garden has been created with steel and stone, materials that reflect the strength and resilience of those living with mental illness. The design highlights that an open conversation can be the first step along the path to recovery thereby infusing a positive message of hope.

Bord Iascaigh Mhara’s (BIM) Aqua Marine Garden concept garden designed by Oliver and Liat Schurmann aims to raise awareness of Ireland’s marine environment and the need to protect it against the growing threat of marine waste. The underwater marine garden resembles a giant rock pool where seaweeds, sea creatures, and other marine habitat live in harmony. This may be one of the first times a garden that’s entirely underwater has been staged at an international garden show.

Aqua Marine, sponsored by BIM, portrays the magical  and natural beauty of this underwater world full of life. However, evidence of pollution, particularly plastic waste, surrounds the garden.

A large fishing net is suspended over the marine garden. It symbolises the actions being led by BIM with fishing communities and the wider seafood sector to protect Ireland’s marine environment.

This garden highlights the work of Enable Ireland, a charity that provides services to people with disabilities and their families. The theme of the garden is “Diversity Values Everyone Equally” and it seeks to celebrate the uniqueness of each individual while recognising and respecting their differences – be they differing abilities, ethnicities, or age.

Enable Ireland’s Diversity Garden is an accessible space, inclusive to people of all abilities and ages, with an open layout and accessible raised planters. Above all it is a beautiful garden space to be enjoyed by everyone.

The garden layout fuses curved lines with bold modern materials, and contrasts elements of mirror, copper, and coloured glass with natural planting and water. A “floating” twisted copper coil canopy introduces height and form and, alongside bespoke sculpture, creates a focal point in the garden.

Tóg go Bog é, meaning “Take it Easy”, as Gaeilge (in Irish), is a celebration of nature and its many benefits.

The garden, which is designed by Vocational Training Opportunities Scheme in Cabra Community College, is inspired by the Wicklow landscape. While beautiful, the heather uplands represent man’s activities, created through the removal of forest to provide timber or grazing land. The message is that a landscape can be altered slowly and imperceptibly to a point of no return by human activities, emphasising our continued and often negative impact on the environment.

The garden incorporates local materials such as granite and mostly native plants, including ferns, hawthorn, mountain ash, as well as heather. Many of the plants within the garden can be used to create dyes for wool and textiles. This hints at the fictional owner of the garden who creates beautiful goods from what they find in the local environment.

This garden reflects the partnership between Cheshire Ireland, an organisation that supports adults with physical and neurological conditions, and the people who use the services.

Leonard Cheshire, a Victoria Cross decorated Royal Air-Force (RAF) Officer in World War 2 (WW2), founded Cheshire in 1948. A pioneer in healthcare for adults with disabilities, he opened the first service in Ireland in 1961 in Shillelagh, Co Wicklow. His legacy lives on in over 50 countries around the world.

Birch trees, a pioneer forest species, represent the influence of Leonard Cheshire’s work ethos and the continuation of that work in Ireland today. The willow wattle, willow nest, and Irish woodland signifies the support the organisation gives to people in making positive choices around where they live. This combined with the sculpture of a figure facing forward indicate balance, growth, learning, and harmony. They are a tribute to the people living in Cheshire Ireland Services who use the challenges they face in life to grow and move forward.

The FBD Insurance Urban Sanctuary Garden is designed for a contemporary urban lifestyle, inspiring those living in towns or cities to become more engaged with their outdoor spaces. The garden will encourage visitors to realise the potential for any outdoor area, whether it’s a compact garden, an apartment balcony, or an allotment.

Designed by Kevin Dennis, the garden includes architectural elements of cutting edge hard landscaping trends, creating a space that exudes modernity, diversity, calm, and well-being. The planting is diverse, illustrating the nature of plants in urban areas and how plants and trees from around the world can thrive in the mild Irish climate.

With structured multi-stem trees, warm palms, dry-climate plants, and drifts of grasses and perennials, the planting has a warm colour palette and creates an inviting tone so visitors are drawn into the space. This colourful garden will visually spark the flames of the contemporary Irish spirit.

Inspired by a recent visit to Doña Paula’s home in Mendoza, Argentina, Rudden brings elements of the region and sprawling landscape to this garden while representing Doña Paula’s campaign, “A Matter of Altitude”. He captures the contrast between the lower altitude, urban social life of Mendoza city, and the higher altitude, more rural, open landscape where Doña Paula’s vines are grown.

The garden boasts two main functions: the lowest point is a semi-covered entertaining and cooking area where you can enjoy an Argentinian ‘asado’ (an outdoor gathering of friends featuring a South American-style barbecue). This is complemented by a pathway that represents the higher altitude vineyards of Mendoza. Open to the public, it rises through the garden to the highest point where the Doña Paula bench is located before descending to the garden exit.

The Fingal County Council and Technological University Dublin (TU Dublin) Bee Positive Show Garden emphasises the importance of pollinators within our rapidly urbanising environments.

This pollinator-friendly concept garden is targeted primarily at children in a bid to increase their understanding and awareness of the importance of pollinators. Its goal is to help sustain a diverse range of pollinator insect species for the future.

The garden is designed by Fingal County Council and TU Dublin with help from garden designer, Jane McCorkell, and demonstrates how to create and protect habitats for pollinators – including bees and many other insect species – within a usable, outdoor recreation space. It features a pathway so visitors can walk through the garden and learn more about pollinators. A large honeycomb wall is decked with fun facts, and offers a glimpse of the working beehive on the other side of the screen.

The Kildare Growers Group garden for Crumlin Children’s Hospital serves as a place of solitude, a sanctuary where the owner can temporarily unwind and enjoy peace and silence within a series of relaxing spaces.

Sponsored by Crumlin Children’s Hospital, the garden is designed by Anthony Ryan, a landscape architect and partner in Hayes Ryan Landscape Architecture, and Kieran Dunne of L&K Dunne Nurseries, a member of the Kildare Growers Group.

A key feature is a secluded, sheltered alcove that can only be accessed via stepping-stones over a circular pool. Contemporary in style, the garden is structured with simple curved and sloped walls that gradually reveal the alcove, which is a refuge at the heart of the inner garden.

The Healthy Way has been created to reflect a dual vision that Ireland is a place where people can be inspired and feel empowered by their natural surroundings to improve their health and well-being.

The garden represents a public space that links healthy eating, healthy movement, and well-being through a series of seasonal planted areas and water, spread throughout a mixed perennial environment and mature woodland setting.

The woodland was chosen as the main backdrop as trees offer a language of vitality and health, by providing fresh clean air while also sustaining a wide range of natural ecosystems important for sustainable food production. The water represents movement and hydration, important for life, as well as a quiet space for reflection.

The carving of functional spaces under the trees relays a naturalistic and nourishing planting style derived from plants, which have either an edible or beneficial use, with their arrangement chosen to create a relaxing milieu to the functional spaces.

The Blackwater Gin Garden is a little, green oasis, and provides a multi-functional space to relax, reflect, and entertain.

The garden is designed by Peter Cowell and his business partner Monty Richardson who are both passionate about up-cycling. Built predominantly from reclaimed, recycled, and up-cycled materials; it features strong shapes, textures, and contrasting materials that are softened by lush foliage of semi-shade and shade loving plants.

The garden reflects the Blackwater Distillery’s location in Waterford, with a water feature symbolising the Blackwater River. The materials complement the distillery’s new home in Ballyduff Upper, at a refurbished 50s hardware store.

Most importantly this garden is not just about gin. It it about creating a space for the consumer to sit back and sip a Blackwater Gin and listen to the birds, the water, and nature. Here you can watch the late afternoon sunlight dance through the foliage, relax with a newspaper, or entertain friends late into evening.