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Working on World Child Cancer's Nurturing Garden, designed by Giulio Giorgi, at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2024.
Working on World Child Cancer's Nurturing Garden, designed by Giulio Giorgi, at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2024. Photograph: Guy Bell/Rex/Shutterstock
Working on World Child Cancer's Nurturing Garden, designed by Giulio Giorgi, at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2024. Photograph: Guy Bell/Rex/Shutterstock

Small steps towards sustainable gardens

This article is more than 2 months old

Chelsea flower show | 3D-printed bricks | Tom Lehrer | Saving on electricity | Electric boilers

While it is good news that a sustainable garden has won a prize at Chelsea flower show (Garden with terracotta 3D-print bricks wins Chelsea flower show green medal, 20 May), surely all of the gardens should be environmentally sustainable? Otherwise what are we saying, that you can garden either way? This is ludicrous, given the vital need to stop doing anything unsustainable.
Dr Jennifer Poole
Romsey, Hampshire

A garden made from 3D-printed bricks uses an awful lot of energy printing the bricks. If Giulio Giorgi wanted to give his garden a low carbon footprint, why didn’t he have them made by hand?
James Driver
Chiddingfold, Surrey

In my working years, when presenting the results of a study project, I liked to include a slide of my starting point by displaying Tom Lehrer’s maxim for researchers: “Plagiarise, plagiarise! Let no one else’s work evade your eyes” (‘My songs spread like herpes’: why did satirical genius Tom Lehrer swap worldwide fame for obscurity?, 22 May).
Isobel Gibson
Ledbury, Herefordshire

From Michael Wilkinson (Letters, 20 May) we learn that if you are affluent enough to afford electric cars and heat pumps then saving money on your electricity bill is a breeze. On the other hand, I imagine it isn’t so easy if you are forced to use a prepayment meter.
Peter Day
London

Like Rae Street (Letters, 17 May), I can’t afford an air-source heat pump, an electric car or solar panels. But I can, and did, afford an electric boiler, and have never looked back.
Jim Grozier
Brighton

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