Nonagenarian artist Beryl Hovell has perfectly captured Worth Park’s regeneration through paintings, capturing the conservation project’s progress.
In 2022, Euroflor flower seed from Origin Amenity Solutions (OAS) transformed three meadow areas within Worth Park as part of a wider conservation project by Crawley Borough Council.
Worth Park sits within 8.5 hectares of green space, which has undergone a complete restoration over the last few years, making it an important destination venue for residents and visitors to Crawley.
Hovell has tracked the development of the park’s meadow area over the past three years through her artwork.
She created her piece 2022, at the age of 90, and has recently completed her third painting, with all three paintings now on display in the community room at Worth Park.
Hovell explains: “I saw the newly seeded wildflower meadow at Worth Park in 2022. What a lovely colourful sight. As an artist, it inspired me, and once that vision was in my head, I had to paint it on canvas.
“A year later, I painted it again. It was interesting to see the differences and variations in growth, flowers, and colours. In 2024 I saw it for the third time. Now there were more grasses and fewer flowers. When the wind caught the grasses, I loved the movement and tried to capture it in the painting with small dots of colour emerging.
“A photograph can capture one view, but an artist can condense a number of views into one and inject a feeling of movement that a camera cannot.”
Stephen Peters, head gardener and curator at Worth Park, first introduced the wildflowers to increase plant diversity and provide an essential habitat and food for pollinators.
He used OAS’s biodegradable matting, FloraFleece, which helped deliver maximum visual and ecological benefit with minimal environmental impact.
“It has been a real pleasure seeing Beryl’s works of art that have followed the progress of our wildflower meadow using FloraFleece in the last three years,” says Peters.
“These paintings now hang proudly for all to see and admire. Not only do they demonstrate the evolution of the meadow but also the brilliance of the artist who captured it.
“At the same time, it reminds us of the beauty of meadows and how important they are for the environment and its biodiversity.”
