MADE TO ORDER

Many of the best gardeners start early. Mark Hoffmann was just three years old when he sowed his first carrot in his father’s big vegetable garden in the historic Geelong suburb of Belmont.

Originally from Silesia — then in German Prussia, now part of Poland — the Hoffmann family has grown deep roots in Australia over the past one-and-a-half centuries. They came to Victoria via South Australia where the family once owned a winery.

Mark is Geelong born and bred. He grew up on his father Martin’s 760m2 block in Belmont, three doors away from Mark’s grandfather Heinrich, a Lutheran minister. Martin grew flowers for three churches