Pro Landscaper’s Most Influential Nursery Person of the Year, Lewis Normand on how his reasoned approach helps people to resonate with his work.

Since graduating with a Bachelor of Arts Honours Degree in Garden Design from the University of Greenwich in 2001, Lewis Normand has amassed an expansive 20+ years career in the world of horticulture.

Lewis Normand – Bernhard’s Nurseries sales manager

He has seen success designing gardens across the UK, Europe, and the Middle East under the banner iPlantsman – a company he founded – and he continues to share this accumulated knowledge to the next generation through giving lectures at colleges and universities to thousands of students.

In 2011 his focus shifted to nursery sales, and is now sales manager at Bernhard’s Nurseries, where his experience and knowledge has seen the nursery go from strength to strength. And now he can add Most Influential Nursery Person of the Year to his already impressive portfolio.

Many will also recognise Normand from his monthly columns with us where he continues to share his insights; exploring a variety of topics that are impacting our industry, from carbon offsetting and the climate crisis, to the decline in nature and the ongoing transition to becoming peat free, to all of which he says:

“I don’t write about anything I don’t know enough about. I’m only writing on the subject areas that I’m confident in.”

And while humbly reluctant to say why he believes people resonate with his on-going work, he concedes and admits, “one of my strengths is that I am pretty reasoned – I’m good at bridging the arguments; I may have an opinion that’s my own, but I’ll also listen to everyone else’s.”

This train of thought feeds into his work in the Cross-Party Group for Gardening and Horticulture, a venture he says is vital for getting the changes the industry needs pushed forward:

“It’s important that our politicians understand what we offer and since we’ve engaged with politicians they’ve really seen what horticulture has to offer – because there are so many good messages that come out of horticulture”; a notion he brings with him to his roles as president of The Caley Royal Caledonian Horticultural Society.

Every new venture undertaken is another feather to the horticultural hat, all which shape both his opinion, he notes:

“There are a lot of things that I’m involved in that give me different little corners of insight.” It’s also his obvious love for the industry and respect for the “amazing” people he continues to work with that go into this, and there seems to be no signs of him slowing down:

“I’m an eternal student of the industry, and I’m also a huge supporter of the industry.”

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  Plant Inspection for Winter Garden at Wakehurst Place 2018

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  L-R Lewis, Kenny Raybould, John Marsden (Bernhards) and Reece Churcher at RHS Chelsea

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  Normand in Pistoia, Italy plant selecting

Check out Normand’s latest opinion piece in the June edition of Pro Landscaper where he reflects on those who are putting nature at the forefront of our minds, here.