Matt James

Garden and Landscaping expert

Matt James is a garden designer, gardening columnist and university lecturer who rose to fame with Channel 4's The City Gardener. He currently stars in ITV's Love Your Garden, and is curator of The Landscaping & Gardens Zone, sharing his green fingers and horticultural expertise.

Fuelled by a passion for plants and gardening he has worked widely within the horticulture industry from production horticulture to landscape construction.  He trained at Merrist Wood, and then onto a degree in horticulture at Writtle College.

For setting up farmers’ markets in Surrey and South London in 2000-01, Matt was awarded ‘Londoner of the Year’. More recently his designs for gardens in California won him two prestigious awards.

Currently Matt teaches on the renowned BA (Hons) Garden Design course at University College, Falmouth. Two of his students have won the coveted Society of Garden Designers ‘Student of the Year’ award.  In 2010 his students’ entry for the Hampton Court Palace Flower Show won gold.

The City Garden Bible, published by Transworld, is the most recent of his three gardening books, but Matt has also written for numerous publications on garden design and gardening, including The Sunday Telegraph, The Sunday Times, Garden Life, and The Garden and News of the World. Currently he writes a monthly gardening column for Real Homes.

Speak to Matt in The Landscaping and Gardens Zone, or for one-on-one fifteen minute advice sessions in The Advice Centre.  He will also be speaking in our Real Homes Live! Theatres.  For a full time-table of talks, please see here.