(Back row) Keith Delderfield, Director of Operations, the Douglas Bader Foundation (left) with Douglas Bader Community Garden group secretary Susan Blake from Cupar.

(Front row) Lady Bader, OBE (left), with the group's Chair, Marilyn Carr.

Photograph taken at Elmwood College, Cupar, on Tuesday August 1, 2006

Douglas Bader Foundation

Lady Bader, OBE, attends announcement of design company for world class garden

Tuesday, August 1st 2006: AN organisation which is attempting to transform a vandal-hit garden into a top tourist attraction and community facility has announced a formal link up with a world class landscape design company.

The Douglas Bader Community Garden group, a non-profit making organisation based in Cupar, Fife , today ( Tuesday, August 1 st 2006 ) announced that Glasgow-based firm TGP Landscape Architects had been chosen as lead designers for their prestigious project.

TGP Landscape Architects was established in 1994 by Landscape Architects Rachel Tennant and Nicola Garmory with the aim of providing and original and imaginative design consultancy. The company was set up specifically to offer clients a high quality service in all aspects of project design, management, and implementation.

Since then the practice has been involved in a variety of successful urban regeneration, environmental and landscape design projects, acting in the role of individual designers, members of multi-disciplinary teams and project coordinators in the private and public sectors.

The announcement was made at a special reception at the town's Elmwood College in the presence of Lady Joan Bader, OBE, the wife of the late

WW2 flight hero, and his wartime RAF number two Sir Alan Smith, the former owner of many of Scotland's top knitwear labels.

Following a public consultation process which consisted of a special information leaflet and reply postcard being sent to 10,000 addresses in the entire KY15 postcode, the Bader group chose TGP Landscape Architects to develop the new garden masterplan.

Originally opened by the war hero, the garden fell into disrepair and suffered from vandalism before the local group saved it from closure in 2005. The Douglas Bader Community Garden group, which has formed partnerships with Fife Council, Elmwood College , RAF, Kingdom Housing and Cupar Community Council, aims to redevelop the Duffus Park site as an innovative enabling garden suitable for people of all abilities, and to establish a therapeutic garden service and North American volunteer gardener scheme.

Lady Bader, OBE, who lost her husband in 1982, was making her second visit to the market town in less than a year to support the scheme, along with Keith Delderfield, Director of Operations of the Douglas Bader Foundation charity.

Lady Bader, OBE said, "I am delighted to be back in the town where Douglas and I first came in 1982 to open the original garden which was named after him. This is a tremendous opportunity to create something special for people of all abilities and to establish a volunteer scheme and first rate garden attraction which will put the town firmly on the map."

Cupar-based Andrew Gold, the group's Project Manager, called the announcement "fantastic news" and claimed TGP Landscape Architects would deliver an exceptional garden design.

Mr Gold said: "We wanted a company with a substantial track record and after taking public opinion into account this is what we have got. I am confident we can obtain significant funding from public grant awarders when TGP Landscape Architects deliver a first rate design."

At the ceremony Lady Bader, OBE, was entertained by Pipe Major Thomas Williamson from Leven, who composed a special musical tribute to Group Captain Sir Douglas Bader. Pipe Major Williamson, 68, who has taught the pipes for 30 years, presented Lady Bader, OBE, with a framed copy of his composition.

Pipe Major Williamson said: "I was brought up on the Bader story of courage and wanted to pay my own special tribute to an inspirational man who was one of my personal heroes."

NOTE: Double amputee Douglas Bader , the World War 2 hero, was an exceptional pilot and leader. In 1931, an air accident resulted in the amputation of his right leg above the knee and the left below the knee. He was discharged from the RAF and divorced from flying. After a struggle, he was allowed back where he belonged and took command of a Squadron. An innovative leader, his inspirational qualities became legendary. But his luck ran out when his aircraft was brought down and he was taken prisoner and later incarcerated in Colditz. After the war he dedicated himself to improving the plight of disabled people, and in 1976 he was knighted. In 1982 (the year of his death), the late Sir Douglas and Lady Joan were specially invited to open the original garden in Cupar, built to commemorate the International Year of the Disabled. Lady Bader, the daughter of steel-mill owner Horace Hipkiss, was awarded the OBE in 1999 for "Services to Disabled People." It is no exaggeration to describe the late war hero as perhaps the most famous man of his generation in the UK and beyond. The BAFTA-winning film "Reach For the Sky" further immortalised the Bader legend.

Contacts : Andrew Gold, Project Manager, Douglas Bader Community Garden 01334 650881 Mobile : 0781 5167958 Email: andrew@dbcg.org.uk
Pipe Major Thomas Williamson 01333 301323
TGP Landscape Architects : www.tgp.uk.com 0141 429 2999

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