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Sat 07 Jul 2007Watch his spaceGerard Mullen has hit the ground running. Or perhaps I should say he has hit it measuring and designing and digging and planting. Since finishing his three-year honours degree course in horticulture at Waterford Institute of Technology in May (from which he graduated with distinction), the Dungarvan designer has completed two assured and meticulous show gardens.The first of these, a tiny urban space at Bloom in Phoenix Park, was a simple, but sophisticated offering, full of interesting leaf shapes and contrasting hard landscape textures (I loved the chalk-and-cheese marriage of smooth white concrete and grey, limestone cobbles). He was awarded a gold medal for his efforts.