Meet the Irish landscape architects taking part in Netflix’s new gardening series

Declan and Eoghan are contestants in Netflix’s newest competition show, The Big Flower Fight

If you’ve been searching for a relaxing reality watch to unwind with in the evenings, Netflix has struck gold once again.

Their new series The Big Flower Fight, which landed on the platform this week, challenges 10 pairs of passionate amateur gardeners to create spectacular, large-scale flower installations for a chance to design their own sculpture at London’s Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Each international team will be judged by florist to the stars, Kristen Griffith-VanderYacht, with Vic Reeves and Natasia Demetriou hosting the show.

Featured on the show are two Irish entrants and we can’t wait to see what fantastic floral creations they come up with. Declan and Eoghan both have degrees in landscape architecture and met at UCD eight years ago. The pair now work together covering residential and commercial landscape design and contracting.

Netflix sat down with the Irish team to chat about what we can expect from the series, and it sounds like exactly what we’ve been waiting for.

Can you tell me a little about how you met and came to be working together on this competition?

Declan: I’m a landscape architect and contractor. I started off in art design, then I went into horticulture, and landscaping. Then I got into landscape architecture which is where I met Eoghan about six years ago.

Eoghan: We were mature students — apparently! — so we hung out straight away. I studied carpentry and joinery in my teens, then I started getting into landscaping and planting. I got more and more into landscaping on a bigger scale so I decided to go off and study landscape architecture at college.

Have you had a stand-out challenge?

Declan: We had to create an edible throne and we had our own take on that using Irish history and landscapes. We used a historic link to Newgrange and that was one of my favourite challenges.

What are the other contestants like?

Declan: You’re put into an environment where it’s all new to everyone. We all came together, and it was a bit ‘us and them’ with the judges. You’re all against the clock, you’re against the judges, so we just saw the funny side of all of that and cracked on with it.

Can you sell the show to the viewers?

Eoghan: I think they will probably have to put it in the ‘comedy’ section of Netflix! We’ve had a lot of fun, and I know the editing team will make it look even more spectacular than it already has felt on the day. It’s also very competitive and very creative. What people produce is spectacular. I think people will see it is much more than flower arranging.  

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