Michael Alexander speaks to Brian Cunningham – the Scone Palace-based presenter of the Beechgrove Garden – which celebrates its 40th anniversary on the BBC this weekend.
St Andrews-raised Beechgrove Garden presenter Brian Cunningham vividly remembers when the seed of horticulture was first planted in his mind.
His mum was a cleaner at St Andrews Bowling Club and, as a nine-year-old, he would spend his summers helping the greenkeeper lay out the lawn.
In his teens, the former Langlands Primary and Madras College pupil also used gardening as a form of exam time “stress relief” at home.
Leaving school in fifth year when he secured a gardening apprenticeship at Craigtoun Park, seven “phenomenal” years working at the St Andrews institution followed, and from there he spent five years at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, three years at St Andrews Botanic Garden, four years at Rossie Estate, Auchtermuchty, before being appointed head gardener at Scone Palace in 2012.
“Never in a million years” did Brian ever imagine that he would become a presenter on one of his favourite TV shows – the Beechgrove Garden.
But that’s just what happened in 2015 when, after Scone Palace hosted a chilli festival and Beechgrove’s Carole Baxter challenged him to a chilli eating contest, he became a guest presenter – initially spotlighting community gardening projects.
Now, as the Beechgrove Garden celebrates its 40th anniversary this weekend with a one-hour special programme that takes viewers down the path of Beechgrove’s growth, Brian says it’s little wonder the programme is a perennial fixture on the mantelpiece of Scottish life.
“The good thing about the Beechgrove Garden, especially for someone like me – because I’m still learning on the job – is that, like its viewers, I can also learn from the programme,” says Brian, 43, in an interview with The Courier.
“And because it’s set north of the border its more relevant to our climate.
“I’m not having a go at Gardeners’ World or anything, but a lot of the comments I get say the Beechgrove is more down-to-earth. Sometimes when I watch the relationship between Jim (McColl) and George (Anderson) I feel like an apprentice again.”
Brian remembers feeling “nervous as anything” when he first turned up for Beechgrove filming – not quite able to believe he was in the company of Scotland’s gardening “greats”.
But sitting in the show’s garden bothy, he was very quickly made to feel so welcome, and it’s the “down-to-earth” nature of the show that he believes is at the root of its ongoing success.
“Take Jim,” he says. “Jim is like your pal. It’s like he’s your next door neighbour and you are looking over the fence and he’s saying ‘your needing to do something with those tomatoes’!
“That’s the way I see it. Again, the relationship between Jim and Carole. They have been doing it for years. The show just seems right. It’s a good mix. You get to see other gardens in Scotland – but not just the big showcase gardens like Scone. You are actually going into someone’s back garden.
“They are an amazing bunch to work with. I’m having the time of my life. Great fun!”
Sunday’s programme returns to Beechgrove’s humble beginnings in the back yard of BBC Aberdeen, when the garden was a small, difficult to manage patch of land.
The programme discovers how the earthy knowledge and banter of Beechgrove’s first presenters, Jim McColl and George Barron helped take the programme to unprecedented success.
Jim and George’s use of their own dialects particularly endeared them to a huge Scottish audience, attracting one million viewers in those early days.
It also looks at how Carole Baxter broke ground, becoming the first woman to co-present a TV gardening show in the UK, as well as revisiting the antics and expert makeovers of the Hit Squad.
Introduced and narrated by Scottish comedian Elaine C Smith who also visits the garden at Beechgrove and meets today’s presenters, the show also features embarrassing auditions tapes and stories of presenters past and present – all mixed with a good dose of Beechgrove’s gentle, good natured humour.
Brian adds: “For me coming onto the television, I know I’ve got a bit of a Fifer accent. But listening to the way Jim talks, there’s no doubt I now feel confident to use the words tatties, or dreich, that sort of thing. Jim’s given us an identity and we should be proud of it.”
Fellow Beechgrove presenters speak highly of Brian too.
George Anderson says: “He has just got such a gentle way of telling people about things, about explaining about things. He’s such an expert.”
Carole Baxter adds: “Well, I look up to Brian because he’s quite tall, isn’t he?”
- The Beechgrove Garden Story, Sunday August 19, BBC One Scotland, 5.35 – 6.35pm.
