Last month, the Beautiful Scotland campaign was launched in Arden, Glasgow, by Carole Baxter of The Beechgrove Garden and John Summers OBE, Chief Executive of Keep Scotland Beautiful.

Beautiful Scotland is the new name for Beautiful Scotland in Bloom, an environmental campaign for villages, towns and cities that gives them a focus and reward for their efforts to improve their surroundings – and has done so for over 40 years. Entrants are judged each summer on four areas: horticultural displays, sustainability and biodiversity, local environmental quality issues (such as litter and graffiti) and community participation. The new name has been chosen to better reflect these varied, but key, campaign themes.

Category and Discretionary Award winners are announced at an annual Presentation of Awards, which this year will be hosted by Dundee City Council on 19 September at the Caird Hall.

The campaign also has a non-competitive scheme: Neighbourhood Awards, for beginner groups particularly (but not exclusively) in urban areas. The scheme is straightforward to enter and all groups receive a visit from an assessor in August and are presented with a certificate at the Beautiful Scotland annual seminar in November. Please note, closing date for Neighbourhood Award entries is the end of this month.

For further information, please logon to: www.beautifulscotland.org or contact Rachel Kerr, Beautiful Scotland Co-ordinator, on 01479 811477 or email: rachel.kerr@ksbscotland.org.uk