Crowds help sow the tweets at Lincolnshire Show

16 June 2014, Press Releases

Showgoers' tweets will help to power an award-winning garden to life at this year's Lincolnshire Show.

The tech-savvy garden which turned judges' heads at RHS Chelsea 2013 is now coming to the showground.

A unique use of both gardening and social media, when visitors tweet about the delights on offer at the showground, the buzz of social media makes the Gold winning University of Lincoln's Crowders Nurseries Social Media Garden come to life.

Obscured by an autonomous-panelled screen, the live garden reacts to activity on Twitter when people use the #lincsshow hashtag, with the inner depths of the garden only being seen when public excitement is at its peak.

It works by showing various panels pop up and permitting selected views of the 'concealed' garden. People will also receive an image of the garden tweeted back to them.

Amelia Highfield, marketing manager for the Lincolnshire Show, said she cannot wait to unveil the garden to the public for the first time since its appearance at RHS Chelsea last year.

She said:

"We feel really privileged to have been chosen by the University of Lincoln to set this unique garden up on the show ground for members of the public to enjoy.
"It is ground-breaking in the terms of how technology is used. We want to encourage the members of the public to get tweeting and hash tagging to see their views and thoughts on the show displayed live in this amazing garden."

The garden, designed and created by The University of Lincoln, aims to explore aspects of how social media data can be linked with real space, as well as how it is possible to make sense of this data by creating striking visualisations.

The living hub of social media has been sponsored by nationally renowned and specialist horticultural experts, Crowders, in Horncastle.

Crowders Nurseries, a seventh generation family-owned business, has provided the plants for the garden. The nursery's home grown species are raised in the 130 hectare grounds in the Lincolnshire Wolds.

Robert Crowder commented:

"This is a fascinating and unique research project – and we're more than happy to be able to support Lincoln University and Lincolnshire's award winning home grown talent.
"We've supplied a variety of our plants to showcase the installation and we really hope that tweeters get behind the #Crowders hashtag to reveal as much of the garden as possible."

The public can now enjoy the technology-led garden and directly influence how it appears at any one time at the show on 18 and 19 June.