The plant advice team is made up of:

• Margaret Mason
• Sue Lander
• Saul Walker
• Ruth Sands

Ann was a Building Surveyor and Academic but since retiring has been able to spend more time in her garden which is where she is happiest. She loves white flowers, Hardy Perennials and Cottage style gardens. Ann is Vice Chair of the Derbyshire Group. She believes that gardening can bring joy to everyone’s lives.

Brian lives in Denby Dale, West Yorkshire, where he gardens on a north-facing, shady, steeply-sloping site, which the Society is teaching him to regard as an opportunity rather than an obstacle.

Clare has worked in gardening publishing for the past 20 years after studying horticulture at Pershore College. She has worked on the RHS members magazine The Garden, was at the weekly title Garden News for 12 years and has been editor of The English Garden since 2015. She’s a member of the RHS Herbaceous Plant Committee and the Garden Media Guild, of which she’s a former chair.

Diane joined the Lincolnshire Group of the Hardy Plant Society in 2014 and became Group Secretary and Programme Secretary. Despite initially only having superficial knowledge of plants she learnt a great deal from other members who inspired her and led to increased confidence.

Helen is a long standing HPS member. She is the secretary for the Devon Group and runs a very successful Summer Plant Fair for the group each year. She is a member of both the Shade and Woodland and Galanthus groups. She has a wealth of knowledge both about HPS but also the wider horticultural world, and has been opening her garden since 2008 for the NGS. Helen successfully promoted the Society at the Rosemoor Flower Show and was PR and Marketing officer at Bicton College for seven years.

Judy Hallett is a member of Western Counties group. She is currently the chairperson of the group, and co-organised the Annual Lecture Day 2023.

Keith is an active and enthusiastic member of the East Yorkshire Group. He is a firm believer that HPS should be a learning society embracing and enabling the full range of Hardy Planters to develop their enthusiasms.  He also holds the post of Group Secretaries’ Liaison.

Mick, an HPS member since 2009, was chair, speaker secretary and newsletter editor of the Worcestershire group over several years. He was a journalist all his working life until retirement in 2009. He was part of the Worcestershire team that created the national HPS stand at Chelsea Flower Show in 2017, which celebrated the society’s 60th anniversary and which won a silver gilt medal. To help celebrate the Worcester group’s 25th anniversary, he organised a six-day tour of the gardens of County Wicklow, including the masterful Hunting Brook, the sumptuous Patthana and the inspirational Ardán.

Sally has been involved with the HPS Conservation Scheme for many years. Initially she developed an Access database to log all the plants and grower reports. When the post of National Co-ordinator for the scheme came up it seemed a natural fit, so she volunteered. She has grown many of the plants in the scheme in her small back garden, or on her allotment. She has also been Group Secretary for her local Essex group, and recently a Trustee.

Saul is Head Gardener at Stonelands House, Dawlish. He is a National Trust & Kew trained horticulturist, a former shows manager at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, a BBC Gardeners World Live Plant Expert and a member of the RHS Tender Ornamental Plant Committee

Since 2001 Souren has been involved more or less full-time in gardening and garden making. He was taught to respect all plants for the role which each plays in nature, but he is mainly a fan of herbaceous perennials. He succeeds Pam Ratcliffe as editor of the HPS Journal.