Brian completed degrees in sculpture and print-making, and taught for almost 20 years at Crawford College. He now does a lot of consultancy work for the Crafts Council of Ireland, and is currently curating two exhibitions that will open later on this year. He is married to Peter Ting, and is in the process of moving over from his house in Tipperary to live in London.

Anne studied fashion in Limerick, and then went to Paris on a Kilkenny design scholarship in 1981, where she remained for 15 years. She returned and started working with the Crafts Council of Ireland, and went to study garden design in Newtownards.

Anne now lives in Carlingford, and is one of Ireland's leading garden designers. Her show garden, Wirestring Quartet, will be one of the highlights of the garden and outdoor living festival, Bloom 2007, at the Visitor Centre in the Phoenix Park from 1 to 4 June. www. bloominthepark. com

Brian on Anne

Anne and I were born in Baldoyle, but our late father Edward was a garda, so we moved every two-three years and grew up all over the place. My earliest memory is when I was put into Anne's playpen to amuse her, and she hit me on the head with her toy frying pan.

We probably got our artistic side from our late mother Brigid, as she was very involved with crafts, and was always making things, but we all have very good organisational skills, which came from our father. Our brother John works in event and music management, and he was the director of Cork 2005, European Capital of Culture, and was formerly production manager and tour director for U2. He lives near Anne and we're very close to him and his wife Una, and our niece Julia and nephew William.

Anne started her career as a fashion designer, and worked as a brand manger for Lee Cooper International in Paris.

She has more of a sense of design in her background and training, and I have much more of a "fine art" approach.

We have very different ways of thinking, but we both respect each other's expertise, and can see the areas in which each other can be helped. The things I don't see, Anne sees, and vice versa, but we respect each other's territorial rights and wouldn't interfere or try to take control. On my first major international project, it was great to have Anne working with me, because I knew if the ceiling fell in on the day of the show, she could go and fix it without me having to tell her anything.

I was always a very happy single person, but it was when I got to 40 that I began to think I might like to meet someone. It's been 10 years since I started going out with Peter, who is Chinese, and six-foot tall, and Anne and John were wonderful about it when I told them. Our mum had passed away already, but dad's reaction was fantastic, and he got on really well with Peter.

Peter gets on really well with Anne too, and we spend as much time as we can together, although we don't live close together. Much of our social circle is the same though, probably because we have the same interests, such as art, design and architecture.

Anne is very loyal and giving, and she's tough. There's a right way and a wrong way, and she's very black-andwhite about how things need to be done.

She's good fun to be with, and is very sociable . . . but she's terrible in the mornings. She's very thorough, and has an amazing ability to work very hard and honestly at something, and she'll stick with you, no matter what.

Anne on Brian

Brian is two years older than me, and we used to fight like cats and dogs as children, but we were very close. John was away at boarding school, and because we moved so often, it was important to have a buddy to back you up when you started a new school, yet again!

We've always had a great interest in architecture and design, and even as children, we were always building things in Lego . . . we'd spend days building whole towns.

We both finished school in Templemore, as our dad ran the garda training college there, and I have memories of 400 trainees marching by the bedroom window, every Sunday at 9.30 am.

When Brian was working as an artist, I could see that he had a great design eye, and had great potential to be something other than an artist. The first thing we worked on together was styling a shoot for a showcase tradefair for the Crafts Council, eight years ago.

I've always thought that Brian was more talented than me. He's very organised and capable, and is a great colourist, so if I ever need to know what colour something should be, or a mood should be, he's the first person I turn to.

The great advantage to having someone close like Brian is that he's professional, but honest. So if there is something I'm unsure of, I can turn to him and say, "Is that awful?" and he'll advise me. And there's a great practical back-up, because he'll go off and build it, or find it, or solve it . . . whatever needs to be done.

Brian is very kind and generous and good fun, and has a more accessible sense of humour and fun than I have. I tend to be more restrained and hold back a little bit. He's very easy to get on with, although he can be a bit bossy at times, and likes to plan the whole day out in advance.

And Peter is even worse. So when I'm on holidays with them, next day's lunch will be organised since breakfast the previous day, whereas I'd be more casual. I have two cats and a dog, and they eat better than I do!

Brian and Peter had their civil partnership ceremony in Brixton Town Hall in London last year, and it was a lovely day. Brian has a great sense of style, and himself and Peter are an extremely glamorous couple. And they always have fabulous shoes.