The clematis supremo

Delight to have plants blooming for Chelsea, says Peter

- Peter Seabrook

THERE are people in the world of horticulture whose knowledge of plants, their enthusiasm for specific groups, experience cultivating perfect specimens and abilities breeding improved cultivars just leave me in awe. A perfect example is Raymond Evison whose love of clematis and all he has done with them has no equal to my mind.

Raymond was a junior partner to the late John Treasure of Treasures of Tenbury Wells, and friend to the late Christopher Lloyd in the 1970s. Early in the 1980s, after a -26ºC frost decimated much of the nursery stock at Treasures and killed 80,000 container-grown clematis, Raymond upped sticks and bought an empty one-acre Guernsey glasshouse (they call them vineries there because of grape growing in Queen Victoria’s time).