Matthew Biggs
A professional gardener for more than 20 years, Matthew Biggs is now a regular panellist on BBC Radio 4's Gardeners' Question Time.
He studied at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and started in broadcasting with radio phone-ins and Channel 4's Garden Club. He's been a guest on TV quizzes and makeover programmes and has directed the long-running Grass Roots programme for ITV. As well as appearing on BBC Radio 4's Gardeners' Question Time, he also contributes to several magazines, including BBC Gardeners' World, and has written books on houseplants and vegetables.
"It's difficult to identify exactly why I enjoy gardening, but it just strikes a chord with me," he says. "Ignoring the hard work, plants and gardens are inspiring, uplifting, fascinating and perfect, and their sheer beauty is hard to beat. They're just amazing!"
When he was young, his father used to take him and his sister for walks in the countryside and was always pointing out things of interest among the local flora and fauna. Matthew assumes that this cultivated his interest in gardening, but guesses that there must be some genetics involved, too. His mother was a country girl who was brought up in a Warwickshire village, and his grandad always kept a vegetable garden.
His favourite plant is the giant water lily, Victoria amazonica. "It's incredible and like many plants in the tropics, it's just huge, with massive dinner-plate leaves and glorious white flowers! I saw it in the Amazon rainforest. It was one of the most exciting moments of my life."
Roy Lancaster is his biggest gardening inspiration. They met on Matthew's first day on the TV show Garden Club. And since then Roy's given him lots of support, advice and encouragement.
The one garden Matthew keeps returning to is the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He describes it as the greatest botanic garden in the world, with an unbeatable collection of plants, an unrivalled history and masses of horticultural knowledge. And he loves the fact that it's always changing.
