Appreciating... Rust

Rust-to-order has been around for a while and is pretty as well as neat. At this year's Cottesbrooke Plantfinders Fair it was hard to avoid the chic-ness of it amongst the stands and in the hoovered borders by Arne Maynard. There the carefully rusted hoops complement the claret hues of the planting, so immaculately.

But iron which has had a life, and is now keeping busy in retirement, accumulating rust as it goes, is much lovelier. In the less groomed parts of England, bits of beds have been put to practical use for years. My friend Peter remembers his parents growing their raspberries along bedsteads in their Swindon cottage garden. On the Balearic Islands, from which I have just returned, iron pipes and iron bedsprings are cobbled together as gates.
Gates which are impossible to open.