Featured

1 Aug 2018

A show garden designed by Ross Uebergang and Japanese collaborator Yousuke Yamaguchi reveals a sober and troubling message about a threatened and fragile landscape amid disappearing nature. Melbourne writer and landscape designer Yvonne Pecujac reports.

1 Aug 2018

2018 Show Garden - Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show

Unity Garden

"Wandering in from a bush landscape we come across a cross-cultural setting for tea ceremonies and outdoor living. A space where ceramics, textiles, plants and people come together." Deborah Hambleton

Photos: Rob Skoblar, Ross Uebergang, Onerva Utriainen, Gerald

Two award-winning international designers - Ross Uebergang (Australia) and Yousuke Yamaguchi (Japan) - bring together Eastern and Western design aesthetics to create Unity Garden at the 2018 Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show.

Unity Garden will be unique in the history of MIFGS, Australia's premier garden show.

The concept

The Unity Garden draws on a friendship and dialogue between the designers and the traditions of Japanese and Australian garden culture to create a complementary and unified whole.

Current Sponsors

**INNOVATIVE PRODUCTS NATURALLY AUSTRALIAN**

ROCKS AND BOULDERS

GARDEN LIGHTING

About the Designers

Yousuke and Ross met in Japan and worked together, discovering a commonality between the cultures. Both designers' philosophy includes respecting the traditional but evolving it for the modern world. Both are passionate about their work. Above all the aim is beauty.

Yousuke Yamaguchi

Acclaimed landscape and garden designer, Yousuke Yamaguchi was born into the world of horticulture – his family’s plant business in Nagasaki was his childhood playground. After High School, his tutoring continued under a Kyoto garden master before a period of study in the UK, where he was also caretaker of the Japanese Garden at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Returning to Japan to run the family business, Yamaguchi continues to create his signature gardens, blending the traditional with the modern. Influenced by his studies both at home and abroad, Yamaguchi's approach is best expressed in his own words, "I am not a gardener. I wish only to grow alongside my garden."

Awards

2016 - Singapore Garden Festival Gold Award
2014 - Singapore Garden Festival Silver Award
2013 - Gold Award, Best in Show Gardening Japan Cup
2012 - Gold Award, Best in Show, Gardening World Cup (as the implemented partner of Malaysian designer Mr. Lim In Chong)
2010 - Silver Medal, Tokyo International Flower & Gardening Show
2006, 2014, 2015, 2016 - Green Environmental Design Award, Best Award, Japan Landscape & Urban Green Infrastructure

Ross Uebergang

Ross Uebergang is a landscape designer whose work includes projects in Australia, Japan, Nepal and India.

Ross was born and grew up in Victoria’s Wimmera. Ross combines a deep attachment to place with a background in horticulture, sustainability and landscape construction. He believes passionately that landscape design and architecture must recognise the essential role of plants and the potential for gardens to be beautiful, functional and sustainable.

Ross teaches Landscape Design at Swinburne University of Technology, TAFE, and Urban Horticulture at the University of Melbourne, Burnley.

Awards

2015 - Japan Flower Garden Show - 2nd place
2013 - Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show - Exhibition Silver Award
2013 – Victorian Schools Garden Awards – Project Manager of Swinburne University of Technology entry, awarded Silver Medal
2012 - Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show - Don Fleming Medal

Audio: Bensound

Help us realise innovative, cross-cultural landscape design at the 2018 Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show.

Sponsorship opportunities

We will provide your brand with access to an audience of over 100 000 visitors at the 2018 Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show (MIFGS). Your sponsorship will help award-winning designers Ross Uebergang (Australia) and Yousuke Yamaguchi (Japan), to create an East-West Unity Garden at the show.

How will my sponsorship help?

Sponsors will make a valuable contribution towards the construction costs of the show garden and hosting of the Japanese design and construction team (including accommodation, airfares, food).

Sponsor benefits

In the past our show gardens have been featured on Better Homes & Gardens, Vasili’s Gardens, in newspapers and magazines across Australia and on front covers as far away as Thailand and the Middle East. Other opportunities may include:

Associated with what is anticipated to be one the show’s most talked about gardens
An audience of 100 000 people exposed to your brand plus wide TV and press coverage of the MIFGS each year
Promotional opportunities at the show (flyers, business cards, logo on signage)
Advertising on our website - major sponsors on website cover page.
Product placement within the show garden
Social media connection through Facebook and Instagram
Potential magazine promotion after the show
Credits in any video footage.

For more information, contact Ross - info@rossu.com.au