In early August a message came into the Dan Pearson Studio Instagram account.

“Hello, I’m your fellow gardener, Andrii Romantsov, a 30-year-old horticulturist and landscape designer from Kyiv, Ukraine, deeply passionate about plants, naturalistic garden styles, and everything that grows.

Over the past few years, I have built my own garden centre called Plantsman Kyiv, where I grow and sell a wide variety of ornamental outdoor plants. I propagate plants from cuttings, root them myself, and raise them until they are ready to sell. I also design landscape concepts and fully implement the planting schemes — from start to finish. I am a hands-on gardener: I install irrigation systems, lay turf by hand and select and plant all the species myself. I’m a practical horticulturist who works confidently with all tools, including in the art of topiary.

I hold a degree in horticultural engineering from the University of Environmental and Life Sciences in Wrocław, Poland. During my studies, I also spent a semester in Scotland, studying Horticulture with Plantsmanship at SRUC (Scotland’s Rural College) in Edinburgh as an exchange student. These international experiences shaped me professionally and personally and made me fall even more in love with the culture of gardening in the UK.”