One of the highest horticultural honours able to be bestowed on an individual has been presented to Masterton's Kerry Carman.
Carman has been named an Associate of Honour of the Royal New Zealand Institute of Horticulture.
She holds a prominent place in New Zealand's gardening, literature and arts scene.
When presenting her with
the honour, institute spokesman Andrew Maloy said Carman's creativity was boundless and her enthusiasm for nature infectious.
He believes her unique blend of gardening, art and botany has elevated her in the minds of New Zealand readers to the timeless status enjoyed by Beatrix Potter.
Carman taught at Carterton School from 1960 to 1974 but after a fall in her classroom she was unable to continue her teaching career.
After a lengthy hospital stay a friend sent her a white rugosa rose which inspired her to start sketching ? the first steps in a new career as a gardening essayist and botanical artist.
Eight years later she published her first book, Portrait of Garden, which won the A.W. Reed Memorial Award, ran to two editions and became a gardening classic. Carman has subsequently written and illustrated three more books and has achieved the distinction as a founder member of the Society of Botanical Artist (London), a society limited to members earning a living by their work. Her enthusiasm for all plants, but in particular violets, is infinite to the extent that she has crossbred and created new varieties.
From this well of patient observation Carman wrote and illustrated a weekly column in the NZ Listener reflecting her grasp of nature and botany but also her love of music, cooking, history, philosophy and the classics.
A 4000-word essay commissioned by the prestigious garden journal Hortus was a memorable achievement for Carman, along with her inclusion in an anthology of the world's best garden writing, By Pen and by Spade.
In 1994 she was a winner in the Qantas Media Awards for her passionate account of the felling of the tree on One Tree Hill in Auckland.
As if all these achievements are not enough, Carman has moved from her Renall Street home to a new rambling garden in Carverthan Street, Masterton.
The house, admired by Carman for some time, had been owned by three generations of the Keith family and earlier this year was briefly bought by a couple before Carman managed to purchase it.
