Course overview

Discover the perennial planting secrets and planting maintenance schedules from the High Line garden designer Piet Oudolf.

This course reveals Piet Oudolf’s revolutionary plantings of The High Line, New York City’s famous landscaped railway line that cuts through the centre of the city. Throughout the course, you will experience unique top down drone footage of The High Line and The Battery Park, so you can see a bird’s eye view of the plantings and their context.

During the videos, you will walk along The High Line discussing and observing the plants, with Piet Oudolf himself who designed the planting, and Dr Noel Kingsbury his long term co-writer.

As part of the course, we also hear from Andi Pettis, the acclaimed Director of Horticulture for The High Line who reveals fascinating insights on how they continue to maintain and manage the planting as the site evolves.

Once you understand the evolution and maintenance of perennial plantings in a harsh city environment, Dr Noel Kingsbury takes you through a practical approach of how to plant and maintain this type of landscape design.

The second part of the course features the New York Battery Park designed by Oudolf as an earlier work, with Dr Noel Kingsbury and Gabriela Marin (Chief Horticulturalist), Director of Horticulture for The Battery.

Finally you will learn the real ‘how tos’ of achieving the types of designs that Piet Oudolf has successfully pioneered in sites like The High Line and The Battery. Dr Noel Kingsbury talks to Helen Picton from Old Court Nurseries near Malvern in the UK, to teach you the practical activity you'll need to maintain your perennial planting design.

You'll learn:

About Piet Oudolf's garden designs for the New York High Line
How perennial plantings change over time
Garden maintenance throughout the year
Changing planting designs and garden designs to adapt as conditions evolve

Time to complete this planting design course:

Every student is different but in general we think the whole course will take around 10 hours to complete including:

Video lessons: 2 hours in total
Course notes: 30 minutes per lesson
Assignment: at least 1 hour per lesson
Interactive classroom time: 15 minutes
Tutor feedback review (Expert level): 15 minutes

You'll need:

You don't need any special equipment, but you will be evaluating perennial planting designs and planning your annual garden maintenance.

The course is suitable for all levels - beginners to garden designers or horticulture professionals who want to learn from a world-class garden designer.

The course includes:

On-demand video lessons - presented by Piet Oudolf and Dr Noel Kingsbury
lifetime access to the video, notes and interactive class
flexible classes - join and learn when and where you like
downloadable lesson notes
practical (optional) perennial projects
access on your mobile, PC, Mac or laptop
small interactive online classroom chat online to students from around the world

Support the New York High Line gardens

As an important part of this unique course, we were privileged to work with both Piet, Noel and the team run so successfully by Andi Pettis at The High Line. The High Line is able to sustain its beautiful plants, with a team of gardeners, and the entire project is funded by donations. Please join this amazing movement by donating to The High Line to keep this pioneering project alive and to help us spread the word globally.

Ready to get started?

Just add the course to your basket above - choose the 'Expert' option for personal feedback from Noel on your perennial maintenance assignments.

Any questions? Contact us by clicking on the orange speech symbol - we'd love to hear from you.

Watch course trailer

Lesson summary

The life of perennial plantings

How plantings change over time because of plant growth, death and regeneration. Outline of outside factors such as the environment, pests and diseases, shrub and tree growth.

Perennial management through the year

The annual cycle of maintenance needed to keep plants in good condition and improve performance.

The evolution of perennial plantings

How the processes of change outlined in 1) can be managed so that plantings continue to look good but can also be modified or changed as conditions change.

The Evolution of Plantings

An outline of how environmental and other factors such as pests and diseases which stress plants can be managed.

Choose how you want to learn

Expert-level

Develop your learning further with marked assignments and personal tuition:

Start the course whenever you like
Tutor access for personalised assignment feedback & coaching
Certificate of completion and CPD learning hours
Online classroom with up to 20 classmates
Lessons with expert videos & notes
Group chat & direct message with tutor & classmates
Lifetime access to videos, notes & classroom

Peer-level

Get the most from shared knowledge and community study:

Start course whenever you like
Practise what you learn with your peers
Online classroom with up to 20 classmates
Lessons with videos & notes
Course assignments
Group chat & direct message classmates
Lifetime access to videos, notes & classroom

meet the expert

Piet Oudolf & Noel Kingsbury

Legendary Dutch garden designer, nurseryman and author. Working alongside Dr Kingsbury for his Learning with Expert's courses.

Why choose Learning with Experts?

Start whenever it suits you, and immerse yourself in motivational lesson tutorials with expert guidance.

Enhance your learning and personal growth with lesson assignments. Each course includes an optional assignment at the end of every lesson.

Drop a friendly message or respond to your assignment feedback. Our world-class experts are just a click away, ready to help you!

Stay informed about your own progress and those of your peers, and take joy in celebrating achievements along the way.

Chat and share ideas with passionate communities of learners from around the world.

Frequently asked questions

What’s the difference between PEER and EXPERT options?

At Peer and Expert level, you get access to the same core content and features:

Video lesson tutorials led by your expert tutor
Downloadable lesson notes
Option to practise what you learn with lesson assignments
Group learning within an online interactive classroom of up to 20 classmates
Lifetime access to videos, notes and classroom

If you choose Expert level, you get all of the above plus the following:

Personalised assignment feedback and coaching from your expert tutor
Opportunity to interact with your expert tutor through a private messaging system
Certificate of completion.

What is an online classroom?

Our online classroom has been developed to allow you to learn from our experts in a sociable environment alongside up to 20 other students. After each video tutorial led by your expert, you will be encouraged to practice what you have learned with optional assignments - these can be seen by the other students in your class, who are free to share their own thoughts and questions with you.

You will be encouraged to take part in an ongoing class discussion where you can discuss ideas, post images or work, and comment on each other’s assignments. It’s a great way to learn from other like-minded people who share your passion from all over the world.

This means not only do you benefit from people who are outstanding in their field, but also from a close-knit group of like-minded people whom you can learn alongside. Group learning has shown to greatly improve not just the experience of studying, but also how well you retain the knowledge, and we have built our classroom experience around this fact.

When can I start my course and how long will it take?

You can start your course any time within 12 months after receipt of your purchase confirmation email. Once you start, you’ll have lifetime access — meaning you can revisit the lesson videos and notes whenever you want.

Our courses are designed so that you can study at your own pace, some prefer to binge learn while others like to spread their studying over a longer period of time - it’s completely up to you. To give you a rough time frame, each lesson video is approximately 30-40 minutes long, and we recommend that you spend around an hour on each assignment.

How often can I speak with the Expert?

If you opt for the Expert version of your course, the time you have to interact with your tutor is limited to course length. You will have one week per lesson to chat to your tutor and to have your assignments marked, and during this period you can ask them as many questions as you would like.

To find out the length of each course, head to the product page and look at the Course outline to see how many lessons it contains. e.g. a four lesson course assumes that you will have completed the assignments within four weeks.

Your tutor interaction period will start as soon as you enter the classroom. If you find that you are struggling to complete the assignments in the allocated time or you wish to put this function on hold, just get in contact with one of the team via the support button and we will help you out.

Support and full FAQs

If you need any help with a course, be it one you’ve started already, or one you are looking to purchase, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our Support email address, or view the full FAQ’s here.

You can also use the orange speech bubble on your page to start a conversation with us.

For privacy or data questions, please contact us here.

Perennial Management, The Piet Oudolf Way