How We Met: Patrick Holden & Monty Don

Patrick Holden CBE 57 has been director of the Soil Association, which campaigns for organic food and farming, since 1995. Initially a full-time organic farmer, he still has a 93-hectare organic farm in west Wales, where he lives with his wife and four young sons

Monty and I met through a mutual friend, the writer Adam Nicolson, at his wedding, on New Year's Eve 1992. There was a wild party in this huge mansion which ended up with Adam and [his wife, the gardening writer] Sarah [Raven]'s close friends, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and Monty among them, cooking breakfast at dawn, having partied all night.

I remember Monty wearing his corduroy jacket, and with his black fuzzy hair I thought he looked interesting. So we got chatting. There was something about him and I warmed to him immediately. This was before he was famous. He was on the rebound after his failed jewellery business [which he ran with his wife in the 1980s]. He seemed accessible and porous; as a person he is open about the dark periods of his life.

There was a connection because he was interested in the same things as me; I was a farmer, he was a gardener. We talked about agriculture and sustainable gardening and how, if you understand the simple principles of organic gardening, you could apply those ideas to agriculture.

Subsequently, he became well-known and turned into this rather iconic television personality. I suppose some of the qualities in him that touched me have touched our whole nation. One feels his humanity and his vulnerability: that he turned his experience of depression into an inspirational project with heroin addicts says it all, really.

His stroke [in February] was also a good example of his resilience; it has caused him to rethink about what he can give. The effect has been to focus his energy on where he can make a difference. He said to me at the time, "We should live our lives like every day mattered." Perhaps it takes a major shock to remind us of that.

When, at the end of last year, we had a conversation about who would be the best successor to Jonathan Dimbleby when he stepped down as president of the Soil Association, Monty's name came up. While Jonathan is a hard act to follow, Monty immediately said he would love to do it, but that he would come with strings attached. He said that we should no longer be seen as a trade association or quango [to certify organic food], but should instead be representing the public interest in sustainable farming. He wanted to start recruitment with Britain's 11 million gardeners and take them on a journey, and that sounded brilliant – and here we are.

Monty Don 53 was the main presenter on Gardeners' World from 2003 until earlier this year, when he stepped down after a minor stroke. He recently presented Around the World in 80 Gardens on BBC2 and last month became the president of the Soil Association. He lives with his wife in Herefordshire

I have no clear recollection of the wedding being the place where we met; on the other hand, a lot of whisky was drunk. Adam Nicolson had spoken to me a lot about Patrick – he was somebody he liked very much, so he was already on my horizon; it wasn't just that I met him by chance. So maybe it was at that wedding.

Patrick is an astonishingly charming and positive influence. He is a schmoozer. He has this gift of taking ideals and making them seem a reality, a possibility – and he has applied that gift with huge success. He is alert and open to good in every situation. There is a slight school of ex-hippy in him, a kind of strongly organic tree-hugging persona. He genuinely wants to change things, and to include everybody in that.

Patrick is a bundle of contradictions, too: he is endlessly driving or flying about and planning, so he has a solid carbon footprint; he is very human for such a potentially grand figure. Last week I saw him when he had just flown back from San Francisco, where he was setting up meetings with Bill Gates. That is his glamour. With me it is telly; but anyone who works in telly knows it isn't all that glamorous.

We shamelessly use each other. I use him because he has access to the system; and he uses me because I have access to the telly. Between us we do spend a lot of time thrashing out ideas and possibilities that neither of us could put into the public domain on our own. But between us we can.

Patrick also has a habit of ringing me up, usually when I am in a far-flung corner of the world. I had a phone call in the Mexican jungle earlier this year – where I was filming Around the World in 80 Gardens – asking if I would come and talk to the Soil Association. I told him I was in the jungle. He said I had a whole four hours between my plane landing and the talk he wanted me to give; he is good at persuading you to do things you would normally say no to.

We eat at each others' houses and talk a lot on the phone. We walk, we picnic – he is happiest when talking, eating and sharing ideas. He is also one of the few farmers I have met who has seen the connection between gardening and farming. We have a working friendship which is based on real friendship. And that, for me, is rare.

For more information about the Soil Association, visit www.soilassociation.org

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