Join us to mark Mental Health Awareness Week (12-18 May 2025) as we host a panel of speakers to explore a range of personal and professional experiences that demonstrate how gardening positively impacts us.
To those of us who garden and spend time in green space, the positive effects on emotional and mental wellbeing are undeniably clear.
Published research articles make clear links between gardening’s ability to support social relationships, moderate stress, reduce anxiety and depression, and improve cognitive function.
Chaired by Victoria Valentine, speakers including psychiatrist and psychotherapist Sue Stuart-Smith, Co-Founder of The Glasshouse Kali Hamerton-Stove, Specialist Horticultural Instructor at Bethlem Royal Hospital Sergio Ruano Heredero and food writer, cook and veg grower Kathy Slack will reflect on how gardening positively impacts us all.
Speakers
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Kali Hamerton-Stove
Kali Hamerton-Stove
Kali Hamerton-Stove is a founder of The Glasshouse project, a community interest company that harnesses horticulture and work to provide viable second chances for women in the justice system. Established in 2020 in the disused greenhouses of HMP East Sutton Park, The Glasshouse works with women in the last years of their prison sentence, providing training and employment, working with leading corporate clients including C Hoare Bank, France’s Crick, Pearson and RenaissanceRe. With a 0% reoffending rate, compared to the national rate of 56%, The Glasshouse is an example of how productive and fulfilling employment can rebuild self belief and help women find a better way of life after custody. Kali and The Glasshouse received the coveted RHS Gold Medal at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2024 for their exhibit conceived, designed and built by women in custody or recently released. At Chelsea 2025, The Glasshouse will have a garden designed by Jo Thompson which will be relocated to a women's prison.
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Sue Stuart-Smith
Sue Stuart-Smith
Sue Stuart-Smith is a psychiatrist and psychotherapist who graduated in English literature at Cambridge University before going on to train as a doctor. She worked in the National Health Service for many years, becoming the lead clinician for psychotherapy in Hertfordshire. She currently works for DocHealth, a service that helps doctors suffering from stress and burnout. Her book, The Well Gardened Mind, was published in 2020 and became a Sunday Times bestseller and a Times and Sunday Times book of the year. It has since been translated into eighteen languages. Together with her husband, Tom Stuart-Smith, she has recently founded a not-for-profit initiative called The Serge Hill Project for Gardening, Creativity and Health which is offering resources to local schools and charities and provides opportunities to connect with nature for those who have least access. The project is based in an old orchard near their home which has been transformed into a unique learning resource called the Plant Library with a programme of talks and workshops open to any one interested in nature and gardens.
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Sergio Ruano Heredero
Sergio Ruano Heredero
Sergio is a Specialist Horticultural Instructor running a food growing project at the Occupational Therapy Department in Bethlem Royal hospital, part of South London and Maudsley NHS Trust. With a background in environmental biology and certifications in biodynamic farming and organic growing, he combines sustainable practices with hands-on therapeutic work with hospital inpatients. Now studying occupational therapy, he’s passionate about how gardening supports mental and physical health recovery. Through his work, he helps people reconnect with nature, fostering well-being, resilience, and a deeper appreciation for the healing power of the natural world with a strong emphasis in food growing
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Kathy Slack
Kathy Slack
Kathy Slack is an award-winning food writer, cook and veg grower. She's a rat race escapee who began her life in food at Daylesford Organic Farm before becoming a full-time writer and presenter, hosting supper clubs and sharing recipes and stories inspired by her back garden veg patch.
Her first book, From the Veg Patch, was shortlisted for The Guild of Food Writers Award for Best Cookbook. She is a regular contributor to Delicious magazine, as well as creating seasonal, veg-centric recipes for various publications and brands, and writing the Substack newsletter, Tales from the Veg Patch. Her next book, ‘Rough Patch: how a year in the garden brough me back to life’, is a memoir (with recipes) about life lessons learnt from the soil.
Kathy gives talks and demonstrations about seasonal food, both in her role as Fortnum & Mason's vegetable expert and around the country at various food festivals, radio shows and podcasts, all with a focus on growing and cooking your own food. -
Victoria Valentine
Victoria Valentine
Victoria Valentine is a broadcaster, brain sciences postgraduate and ambassador for women in STEM subjects and exploration. Alongside her career as a BBC journalist Victoria conducted independent research missions across the North Pacific investigating the impact of ocean microplastic on human hormones. She is a Trustee of the environmental education charity, the Eden Trust, advising the executive team on political risk, advocacy and public engagement for the world’s largest captive rainforest, the Eden Project in Cornwall, and regeneration projects in Qingdao, China and the Nicoya Peninsula in Costa Rica. Victoria is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and part of the planting team working across Hospice UK’s Garden of Compassion and the Daylesford Organics stand at this year’s RHS Chelsea Flower Show.