Rutland garden designer Nicola Oakey named 'one of the best'
Rutland-based garden designer Nicola Oakey has been named as one of the best garden designers in the country.
The 29-year-old has won a ‘30 under 30’ award by ProLandscaper magazine, which every year recognises 30 young people for their work and future potential.
Nicola moved here from the South West in 2014 and after living in Stamford, now lives at North Luffenham.
She has also worked with garden designer Adam Frost at Barnsdale Gardens.
Nicola’s latest award adds to her two Royal Horticultural Society Medals (one Gold and one Silver-gilt) for Show Gardens that she has designed and built. The most recent was at RHS Tatton Park Flower Show in 2018 when she was the only female finalist in the Young Designer of the Year Awards.
When Nicola isn’t working with Adam, she splits her time between gardening at a private property near Oakham and doing her own design work.
Nicola said: “I’m really proud to have been presented with this award. Designing gardens and working with plants and people is so much more than a job to me, I really couldn’t imagine myself doing anything else. I’m very excited about what the future holds and really do feel fortunate to be working in such a beautiful part of the world.”
Adam said: “It’s great to see how far Nicola has come since I first met her at Barnsdale Gardens five years ago.She definitely deserves recognition as one of the next generation in our industry.”