James Alexander-Sinclair

James Alexander-Sinclair – rather like a careless tightrope walker – stumbled into gardening from cocktail shaking, being Father Christmas and the more scurrilous end of journalism by accident nearly twenty years ago.

Beginning in London he set up Terra Firma Landscapes which, after six years of laying lawns, building walls and moving barrow loads of earth around, he sold in order to move his family to Northamptonshire. At the same time, he progressed to the less muddy end of gardening by developing the design side of the business.

Since then, he has made many truly delicious gardens throughout Britain ranging from small patches in cities to rolling acres in the countryside. Along the way he designed the medal-winning “Horticouture” garden at the 1999 Chelsea Flower Show for Express Newspapers.

Recently he has returned to journalism. His easy, slightly irreverent style makes him an excellent communicator and he has the ability to bring the garden to life on the page. He has written for the Daily Express and Sunday Express, for Homes & Gardens, Period Living, BBC Homes & Antiques, House & Garden, Country Living Magazine and his own house and garden were recently featured in Grand Designs magazine.

In 1999 he made his first television appearance on ‘Collectors Lot – Gertrude Jekyll’ for Channel 4 and since then he has appeared in ‘The Curious Gardeners – Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute’ for BBC2 and appeared as a guest on ‘Small Town Gardens’ also for BBC 2. In the Autumn of 2003 James returned to ‘Small Town Gardens’ as main presenter and the series went out in the Friday night prime time gardening slot on BBC 2 and was a judge for the BBC Gardener of the Year 2003, also on BBC2.

James gives talks to local garden clubs and appeared at the BBC Gardeners’ World Live Show at the NEC in 2004. He is a regular guest speaker at the Malvern Spring and Autumn Shows and other events. James was shortlisted for Best New Talent for the Royal Television Society Midlands Award of 2004.

James has also presented television programmes on both the BBC and Channel 4 – including coverage of the Chelsea Flower Show and the Great Chelsea Garden Challenge. He has hosted the design theatres at the Malvern Spring Show, Hampton Court Palace, Gardeners World Live and the Chelsea Flower Show. He was one of the lead expert presenters on the C4 daily gardening programme ‘Great Garden Challenge.’ More recently, he helped judge the (very flamboyant) Netflix series, The Big Flower Fight.