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Nature heals: Pioneering intensive care project opening at Plymouth’s Derriford Hospital

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  • Bespoke outdoor/indoor treatment area fitted with specialist equipment so critical care patients can spend time in the fresh air and sunshine whilst fully ventilated 
  • Outdoor garden space designed by award-winning BBC TV gardening expert, wheelchair user and former ICU patient Mark Lane
  • Embracing the benefits of nature aims to improve rehab experience and outcomes for seriously ill patients and families 

University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust (UHP) is to harness the positive healing power of nature by encouraging intensive care patients to spend time outdoors, even whilst fully ventilated, thanks to a new £625k treatment area opening in December 2022. 

Patients and staff will be able to feel the breeze and sun on their faces when the bespoke critical care rehabilitation garden room, called The Secret Garden, opens at Derriford Hospital, part of University Hospitals Plymouth (UHP) NHS Trust.

Innovatively, the unit’s life-saving ventilation equipment will be able to run outdoors in the courtyard garden, meaning patients can spend time outside, in a non-clinical environment – an important recovery steppingstone for many. Uniquely, it has been designed by Mark Lane, the UK’s first garden designer in a wheelchair, who himself spent months in a critical care unit after a serious car crash.

The project was inspired by a former patient, Andrew Heveran’s desire to get outside, to feel fresh air, after a life changing attack that left him paralysed. Andrew will be there to cut the ribbon at the opening ceremony.

Kate Tantam, Critical Care Specialist Rehabilitation Sister, who spearheaded the project, said: “Our patients and their loved ones tell us that being in critical care is like a bomb going off in your life, that everything is blown apart. Our job as a multi-professional team is to support them in rebuilding their lives.

“Part of supporting people with their recovery journey after critical care is getting to know them as individuals and exploring with them what they most want out of their future.  For many it is simply time with loved ones, time to restore relationships and play with children and grandchildren in non-clinical environments. It was the desire to support this that the idea for the secret garden at University Hospitals Plymouth was born.”

Getting patients who require ventilation to support their breathing outside in the fresh air takes a lot of work. “They need a team of people and it is not without risk. It is also very challenging in busy hospitals to find private spaces, where patients can relax without feeling overlooked,” said Dr Sam Waddy Critical Care Consultant at UHP.

The team decided in 2018 it needed to build a bespoke garden space where ventilated patients and the critically ill could be cared for in the fresh air with all the specialist equipment that requires. With no similar facilities in the Southwest like this at the time, the staff knew it was going to be a big challenge, made even more complex as COVID-19 hit a year into the project.

Despite this, the team raised the funds for the garden thanks to Plymouth Hospitals Charity, NHS Charities Together and the Trust’s budget.  The new-look secret garden is a bespoke critical care therapy space with floor to ceiling glass exposing a walled flower garden.  Full of nurturing botanicals it provides a space for patients, loved ones and staff to recover together.

Mark Lane has designed the garden to be fully inclusive and accessible, with space for beds and wheelchairs, walking frames and sticks, and with slip-resistant, anti-glare, self-binding gravel surfaces. There will be mixed height planting, some in-ground, others in raised beds so patients laying down or seated can see plants. He said: “Outdoor, green spaces are enjoyed by many, but when your life turns a different corner and you end up in ICU, like I did after my car accident, you become completely unaware of the changing seasons, whether it’s sunny or raining outside and, if like me, you’re fortunate to be able to go outside again the first thing that hits you is the sun on your face, the breeze and the colour green.

“So, when I was commissioned to design this garden for Derriford I felt truly honoured to be able to create a space for patients to enjoy, to improve their physical and mental wellbeing by introducing a Secret Garden. Yes, it’s an awkward space with high walls around all four sides, but this lent itself to a nurturing woodland-style of garden with pops of colour here and there. I wanted the patients to feel the plants and enjoy the textures, engage with the garden, whether that be passively or actively getting their hands dirty during rehabilitation and have a space to reflect. I know, because of the incredible staff, and their amazing fundraising activities, that this garden will flourish over the years and make a huge difference to people’s lives, patients, visitors and staff.”

The secret garden has gone from an abandoned courtyard, to a bespoke critical care garden room with specialist capacity to facilitate full care for ICU patients and their loved ones wherever they are in their recovery journey.  It also provides a welcome outside space for clinical staff to support them with the challenges of working in ICU.

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Notes for editors:

Mark Lane – Mark Lane has gained recognition as a first-class landscape designer, being the UK’s first garden designer in a wheelchair, as well as the first BBC gardening presenter in a wheelchair. As a broadcaster, he’s the gardening expert on BBC One’s Morning Live. He has also been a presenter of the award-winning Gardeners’ World on BBC Two as well as for BBC Gardeners’ World Live and the BBC’s coverage of the Royal Horticultural Society’s Flower Shows – Chelsea, Chatsworth, Hampton Court Palace and Tatton. In 2001 Mark was in a car accident and had to have operations on his spine, which were complicated by him being born with spina bifida. Following a long rehabilitation period Mark studied garden/landscape design through an Open Learning course at KLC, Hampton Court.

University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust – If you would like more information on the hospital itself or want to talk to staff please contact communications.phnt@nhs.net

 

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Gardening broadcaster and designer Mark Lane shortlisted in National Diversity Awards

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Gardening broadcaster Mark Lane has been shortlisted in the Celebrity of the Year category at this week’s National Diversity Awards 2021, alongside Sir Lewis Hamilton and Marcus Rashford.

Mark, the gardening expert on BBC One Morning Live and a presenter on QVC and BBC Gardeners’ World, became the UK’s first garden designer in a wheelchair, as well as the first gardening broadcaster in a wheelchair on British television.

As well as Mark, 11 other nominees have been shortlisted for the National Diversity Awards (NDA) Celebrity of the Year including Ashley Banjo and Raheem Sterling.

Community organisations and role models from across the UK will head to Liverpool on 4th February to witness the country’s 2021 NDA winners being crowned the best of British diversity. Amongst those being honoured are charities, campaigners and activists, all of whom work tirelessly to combat injustice and discrimination in very different ways.

Mark Lane said: “I cannot believe that from 50,000 entrants that I have been shortlisted for Celebrity of the Year. This has come as a complete surprise. The competition is extremely tough, and while, of course, it will be wonderful to win, I am honoured and over-the-moon for just being considered as a finalist. Being shortlisted also puts the spotlight on disability in a positive way. We have a tremendously talented and diverse mix of people in this country and it’s wonderful that these prestigious awards, covered on ITV News, see and promote diversity in such a positive way.”

Designed to highlight the country’s most inspirational and selfless people, the NDAs continue to gain endorsements from high profile figures such as Sir Lenny Henry CBE and Graham Norton. Activist Katie Piper, Emmerdale star Ash Palmisciano and Paralympic Gold Medallist Danny Creates were on this year’s judging panel, dedicating their time to help choose the highly anticipated shortlist.

Author and philanthropist, Katie Piper said: “I am so proud to be on the judging panel for the National Diversity Awards. In what has been a tough year for many, I am so pleased these awards create and celebrate a new generation of positive role models. As a campaigner myself, I will love reading about the excellent achievements of grass-root communities which tackle the issues in today’s society with sheer dedication. I can’t wait to honour these charities, role models and community heroes who will have shown outstanding commitment to enhancing equality, diversity and inclusion.”

Previous winners include actor Warwick Davis, men’s mental health charity Andy’s Man Club and breast cancer survivor Codilia Gapare.

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About Mark Lane – Mark is the UK’s first garden/landscape designer to be in a wheelchair. He is a regular presenter on BBC Morning Live and QVC, and also presents on BBC TV Gardeners’ World coverage of the RHS shows. Mark graduated from University College London in Art History with B.A. (Hons). Mark had a meteoric rise in publishing becoming the Publishing Director for the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) and the Managing Editor for the leading international Arts publisher Thames & Hudson. In 2001 Mark was in a car accident and had to have operations on his spine, which were complicated by him being born with spina bifida. Following a long rehabilitation period at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, Stanmore, Mark studied landscape design through an Open Learning course at KLC, Hampton Court. He passed with distinction and set up Mark Lane Designs Ltd, an award-winning landscape design practice (Landscape Designer of the Year 2020). Mark is also an Ambassador for four charities, Patron and a Trustee for two other charities, with a strong emphasis on social and therapeutic horticulture, gardening and health and wellbeing. A prolific writer, Mark’s book ‘Royal Gardens of the World’ has recently been published by Hachette (UK).

Visit: https://www.marklanedesigns.com or www.marklane.tv or follow Mark on Twitter: @MarkLaneTV

 

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Designer and broadcaster Mark Lane helps create first ITV logo ident of 2021

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  • Nature-themed collaboration with London-based collage artist Sharon Walters
  • Work aims to amplify ‘forgotten voices’ of black women and disabled people
  • First horticulturalist to create prestigious ident
  • Filmed at Fullers Mill garden in Suffolk owned by horticultural charity Perennial
Mark Lane and Sharon Walters
Mark Lane and Sharon Walters

Millions of ITV viewers are getting a flower-powered telly treat during January with an important underlying message, thanks to a unique collaboration between broadcaster and garden/landscape designer Mark Lane, and collage artist Sharon Walters.

In an ITV-first, two creatives from different industries have been chosen to craft the logo ident shown between programmes on the channel.

Mark and Sharon teamed up late last year to create the collaborative biophilia-based ident which combines hand-crafted paper cut collage and landscape design. Inspired by the beneficial power of nature, plants in Mark’s Kent garden and Sharon’s love of plants and flowers, the pair reinvented the ITV logo using an intricate layered collage. Their creation was then enlarged (4m x 8m) and temporarily installed for filming in a silver birch woodland at Fullers Mill garden near Bury St Edmonds in Suffolk, owned by horticulture welfare charity Perennial.

The ident, which will be broadcast throughout January on ITV, aims to encourage viewers to pause, reflect and exhale whilst enjoying the simplistic, natural beauty of the work.  Entitled ‘Layered Exhaled Expressions’, the project also raises the issues of accessibility, identity and ethnic diversity, and the effects of climate change.

Mark, who is the UK’s first garden designer to be in a wheelchair, said: “Sharon and I are from communities often described as marginalised and through this collaboration we highlight ability in disability and the identity and power in blackness, and the diversity in both.

“Last year was awful for so many, and with our already complex modern lives submerged into unimaginable challenges, we wanted to create a collaborative work that would encourage people to slow down, relax and breathe.

“The concept was that paper would return to the woodland, illustrating renewal, sustainability and biodiversity, and displaying the journey from root, to tree, to final use. I also knew of the perfect spot for the ident installation, a stunning woodland at Fullers Mill. The natural world, flora and fauna, have an incredible ability to improve our mental and physical well-being and we hope our collaborative creation brings just a little of this biophilic power into people’s living rooms.”

Sharon said: “By first creating a hand-cut ITV logo stencil, I initially used a layering of images approach by cutting and gluing new sections until the design felt complete. This method proved difficult to transfer to the scale Mark and I envisaged, so I returned to the ITV template, this time creating a collage using real flowers and foliage. I had used this creative process previously in pieces for my ‘Seeing Ourselves’ series and it worked perfectly for the new ITV project.

“To recreate the design to a larger scale I photographed the work so it was ready for Mark to transfer to his landscape design CAD programme where large-scale pieces were planned and designed. This was a truly collaborative approach at every stage, and Mark and I have become great friends throughout this process.”

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About Mark Lane – Mark is the UK’s first garden/landscape designer to be in a wheelchair. He is a regular presenter on BBC Morning Live, QVC and BBC TV Gardeners’ World and also fronts BBC TV coverage of the RHS shows. Mark graduated from University College London in Art History with B.A. (Hons). Mark had a meteoric rise in publishing becoming the Publishing Director for the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) and the Managing Editor for the leading international Arts publisher Thames & Hudson. In 2001 Mark was in a car accident and had to have operations on his spine, which were complicated by him being born with spina bifida. Following a long rehabilitation period at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital, Stanmore, Mark studied landscape design through an Open Learning course at KLC, Hampton Court. He passed with distinction and set up Mark Lane Designs Ltd, an award-winning landscape design practice (Landscape Designer of the Year 2020). Mark is also an Ambassador for 4 charities, Patron and a Trustee for 2 other charities, with a strong emphasis on social and therapeutic horticulture, gardening and health and wellbeing. A prolific writer, Mark’s new book ‘Royal Gardens of the World’ has just been published by Hachette (UK).

Visit: https://www.marklanedesigns.com or www.marklane.tv or follow Mark on Twitter: @MarkLaneTV

About Sharon Walters – Sharon  is an artist, freelance educator, and museum professional. She graduated from Central St Martins in 2011 with a BA in Fine Art, holds a Post Graduate Teaching and Learning Certificate in post-16 citizenship education from the Institute of Education, and a BA in Social Science from University West London. Since January 2018 Sharon has been working on a mixed media collage series entitled ‘Seeing Ourselves’, now with over 250 pieces in the collection she has exhibited in a number of public spaces including the Mall Galleries, NOW gallery in Greenwich and the New Ashgate Gallery in Surrey. In December 2019 Sharon won the Reach Art prize for excellence in the arts, diversity, and social inclusion. ‘Seeing Ourselves’ explores identity, beauty standards, representation, and natural Afro hair. Her limited- edition prints and bespoke collages have been acquired by collectors globally, and she has delivered collage workshops for clients including the National Trust. Sharon makes hand-assembled collages almost daily to be present, reflective, and mindful. Each collage gives her permission to ‘take up space’ even in places where she so often does not see herself represented. By exploring diverse narratives through partnerships and providing platforms for under-represented voices to be heard, Sharon has had several collaborations with artists, organisations and groups which have developed both her art practice and community outreach work. The fluidity between the two has developed over the years through working with people in various settings. The ‘Seeing Ourselves’ series continues with a number of new and innovative collaborations in the forthcoming months.

 

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TV presenter Mark Lane in the spotlight on Celebrity Mastermind

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BBC Gardeners’ World presenter and Kent garden designer Mark Lane will be fielding tricky questions from John Humphrys when he appears on Celebrity Mastermind on BBC One on Friday 21 December at 8.30pm.

Joining him on the pre-Christmas edition will be broadcaster Reverend Richard Coles, BBC Media Editor Amol Rajan and Celebrity Big Brother winner Courtney Act.

Canterbury-based Mark has nominated Leonard Cheshire to benefit from his appearance on the show with £3,000 going to the disability charity. Mark has close ties with Leonard Cheshire, teaming up with it over the summer to promote the health and wellbeing benefits of gardening as part of a partnership with the National Garden Scheme, and designing a sensory garden for its Agate House supported living and care home in Bedfordshire.

Mark said: “I have always watched and enjoyed Mastermind, so when I received a call asking if I would be interested in participating, I jumped at the chance. Then, when I put the phone down, started to panic. What had I let myself in for? The whole day, however, was great fun. You will need to watch it to see what my specialist subject is and how well I do. All I will say is that it has nothing to do with gardening or garden design. Also, my questions seemed particular lengthy compared to the others – sorry, that’s the competitive streak in me coming out! If Mastermind calls again, I will say yes!”

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