I'm not quite sure where it's come from but an obsession with watering cans has bobbed to the surface. I only really acknowledged the fetish at the Hampton Court Flower Show recently when I bought two more cans from Pete and Zoe Walker of Garden Brocante who have provided five handsome vessels over the past two years, and props for my last two show gardens at Chelsea. It's an unlikely fascination, particularly as it started during the hose ban of 2006, when sloshing around at the allotment like the tortured Gerard Dépardieu in Jean de Florette was enough to put anyone off watering cans for life. My first three-gallon French pot, despite being a brute to lug around, reduced the amount of trips to the galvanized water tank by half. Now armed with two of these monsters, I'll be even more efficient. And the evenly distributed weight will be less strain on the back.

How does a garden at the Hampton Court Flower Show enrich the soil in Africa? Emma Townshend discovers an organisation that's not afraid to think on the hoof

Sir David Lean is rightly celebrated as one of British cinema's greatest ever directors, the creator of, among others, Lawrence of Arabia, Great Expectations and The Bridge on the River Kwai. And yet little is known of his final project, Nostromo, which proved to be one of the biggest epics never to see the light of day and which caused the downfall of a tormented genius.

As competitors put finishing touches to their Chelsea Flower Show gardens, Anna Pavord meets a former fine artist who’s bringing a painterly vision to her plot

Emma Townshend meets the author of a new book celebrating the contentious work of the avant gardeners

Band of Horses count Bruce Springsteen among their fans. Hardeep Phull on the Sub Pop group fighting off the majors

Marsha McDonnell, 19, had finished her A-levels and was enjoying a gap year before starting university when she fell into Levi Bellfield's trap.

The 'Atonement' screenwriter is up for his second Academy Award tonight. If he wins, he must remember his lines – or face his family's wrath

When the topiary specialist James Crebbin-Bailey ( www.topiaryarts.com ) showed me some pictures of a small front garden in Hampton, Middlesex, I could have kissed him. Fortunately for him, we were at an RHS event and someone had just started to make a speech, so puckering up and embracing in the middle of the Westminster Hall just wouldn't have been appropriate.

Mostly used for colour in rock and pop, the vibraphone has been a bona fide lead instrument in jazz for decades, most notably with Lionel Hampton, who presented a six-year-old Roy Ayers with a pair of mallets at a concert in the 1940s.

The acid test on economics will be opinion in the City

Sir: Apples! Steve McDonnell should worry (Letters, 2 February). While I waited 20 minutes for a bus in Teddington High Street this morning 18 drivers using mobile phones passed me. Sad to count, I know, but little else to do in Teddington High Street at 8am. Oh yes, three were bus drivers - alas or thank God, not mine.

Hampton Court is about to go on the open market with the estate agents Knight Frank.