WITH eight acres of formal gardens to tend to, Gordon Baillie’s ‘office’ is a little different to most people’s.

Arley Hall’s head gardener leads a team of five and organises tasks for around 20 volunteers as he tends to one of Cheshire’s ‘Gardens of Distinction’.

Created over the last 250 years by successive generations of the Ashbrook family, Gordon helps grow 55,000 plants a year for the ever-changing gardens.

And I was invited to join him for the afternoon to see what being a green-fingered professional is all about.

Working alongside Gordon on the bed at the front of the Jacobethan-style Grade II* hall, we were tasked with finding plants that would complement the Bishop of Llandaff dahlia.

The scarlet flowered plant was chosen as the bed’s centrepiece by Lady Ashbrook and she also handpicked a black knight calla, with red flowers and dark foilage, which can grow to 6ft tall.

So I helped plant red riding hood and fascination dahlias and castor oil plants (ricinus communis) which Gordon felt would match Lady Ashbrook’s choices.

He said that adapting the gardens to the Ashbrook family’s tastes was one of the most interesting parts of the job.

Mostly because Lady Ashbrook is said to have a meticulous memory and will often talk of plants she had decades ago or describe ones that she saw on her travels.

It is then like a treasure hunt for Gordon as he first has to work out what the plant is and then where to find it.

The results are always special as anyone who has enjoyed Arley’s gardens will attest.

Arley’s herbaceous border is believed to be the first of its kind planted in England and the estate is renowned for its pleached lime avenue of trees.

And just working in front of the hall, it was fascinating to watch the bed develop and take shape and colour after just a few hours’ work.

I was also shown a bit of ‘horticultural trickery’ with cardboard biodegradable plant pots which help protect the plant’s roots and save time and energy in one fell swoop.

Gordon, who has been at Arley for five years, got into gardening during the miners’ strike and the three day week.

Liking the idea of creating ‘something from nothing’, he planted potatoes in his back garden with his dad John.

Within three years Gordon had taken over the garden with his own greenhouse and by the time he was about 14 he was paid by neighbours to do their gardens.