Post-Chelsea Report, with Queen

by Guest Blogger Graham Rice of Transatlantic Plantsman

The Chelsea Flower Show is a huge show squeezed into a small space. The eleven-acre site alongside the River Thames features:

• A three-acre floral pavilion containing over 100 floral exhibits staged mainly by plant nurseries and ranging in size from 50ft x 35ft (imagine 400sq ft of roses!) down to 10ft x 10ft; six roof gardens; a lecture theatre; and, in the Lifelong Learning section, 18 educational displays.
• Twenty outdoor show gardens, the ten largest all 100ft x 35ft
• Smaller outdoor show gardens in three series: six Chic Gardens, six City Gardens, seven Courtyard Gardens
• A floral design marquee
• Hundreds of trade booths
• A wide range of catering facilities
• Hospitality village
• Bandstand and informal lawns, paths and mature trees
• Press tent, TV and radio facilities, offices etc
• 157,000 people spread over five days.

So much concentrated flower power makes for a very intense visit, and it’s a privilege being an “insider” like me - I’m a judge, reporter, blogger and photographer at the show – and William Hughes, who’s helped build gardens at the Show and posted about the show last week. We get to look at the exhibits and reflect quietly before the crowds arrive. 

At 5 a.m. on Tuesday, three hours before the gates first open to the crowds, everything is at its absolute peak and almost no one else is there – it’s magical. I once saw a red fox padding its way, slightly bewildered, through a large exhibit of cacti. And birds are regularly heard singing at the crack of dawn above their nests built in trees which have been planted on the show gardens for just a couple of weeks.

But those of us privileged to go regularly, and to see the show in these quiet early moments, can become overcritical. Of course, the overall standard varies from one year to another. But it varies within degrees of extraordinary excellence.

And this is why the judging is so important.

By ruthlessly keeping the standards high, the judges ensure the continuing excellence of the displays. For when exhibitors fare poorly they may be replaced by exhibitors who’ve proved their worth in the smaller RHS shows around the country.

So the result is that when any visitor makes their one and only trip to the show they’ll be more than delighted - even if those of us who see the show from the inside year after year may say that one show is not quite as good as another.

The show gardens and floral exhibitors, by the way, do not have to pay for their space; they simply apply, ask for a certain amount of space and are either selected or rejected. There’s no space at the show for plants to be sold, so the floral and garden exhibitors are all there for the publicity (the show is covered from Sunday to Wednesday on BBC1, the most popular UK network channel, for up to 90 minutes a day), to take orders for delivery later and for the kudos that a top medal can bring.

The medals at the Chelsea Flower Show are not awarded on a 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th… basis. Instead, any exhibit which reaches the Gold Medal standard of supreme excellence receives a Gold Medal: this year seven of the outdoor Show Gardens were awarded Gold Medals, along with 45 of the 102 floral display in the Great Pavilion. There could be many or, in theory, there could be none. The medals go down to Silver-Gilt, Silver and Bronze. Occasionally an exhibit receives no award at all – just one this year, an exhibit of Agapanthus on which, I have to say, there was hardly a flower to be seen. It’s been a difficult season. There’s a full list of awards here.

The 600 Days of Bradstone garden won the award for best Show Garden. Popularly known as the Life on Mars garden (after a hit UK TV show) this was curious concept: a personal garden for an astronaut stationed on Mars for 600 days. OK… but why? Why 600 days – why not two years or 500 days? And with the rock and soil almost universally brown and with plants like cacti and spinach unrealistically planted alongside each other I had to disagree with the garden judges – as did almost everyone else.

Chris Beardshaw’s garden based on the garden at Hidcote Manor in Gloucestershire created by the American Major Lawrence Johnston, gained a rather mean Silver-Gilt Medal, but far more people stopped to admire it. The Gold Medal-winning Fetzer Sustainable Winery Garden featured buildings of recycled timber and a sparkling tapestry of California wild flowers. I never heard anyone say anything against it and the planting was some of the finest I’ve seen at the Show. The plants were moved in and out of greenhouses, and back again, many many times as the weather sprung hot and cold in the run-up to the Show.

In the Great Pavilion, some of the smaller exhibits especially took my fancy. Burnham Orchids were celebrating fifty years at Chelsea, with countless Gold Medals, and their exhibit was the first visited by Her Majesty the Queen on her Monday afternoon tour of the Show. The circular hosta stand from Bowden Hostas was immaculate. Well actually, it wasn’t quite. The superb range of large, beautifully grown plants was pristine but it looked as if a cleaner sprucing up the pathways shortly before judging had covered part of the exhibit in dust. They’d tried to wash it off but some of the residue remained. We decided it was unfair to take this into account.

Dave Matthewman’s sweet peas were lovely, staged traditionally in bowls of individual varieties. The new scented pink and white bicolor, ‘Promise’, was especially pretty. The five displays of carnivorous plants, including one from South West Carnivorous Plants, revealed the progress made with hybridising these fascinating and increasingly colorful perennials. Knoll Gardens showed ornamental grasses, including three new introductions, in a naturalistic style. Mulched mainly in moss – from an approved source, a newly felled timber plantation - the plants were superb and the effect compelling. All these won Gold Medals.

So is there a downside? Well, it can be crowded. There’s now a fixed number of tickets available for each day and the RHS keeps adjusting the layout to help improve the flow of visitors but the best, or most high profile, exhibits always draw crowds.

Another problem is that you can’t buy plants; the whole site extends to only 11 acres, and there’s simply not enough space and not enough easy access for nurseries to sell plants. As William mentioned in his Guest Rant, the last day sell-off can be fun. I remember seeing vegetable specialist Medwyn Williams standing high up at the top of his exhibit tossing cauliflowers into the crowd and there’s a classic picture of a policeman carrying off a potted delphinium almost as tall as himself. But on some exhibits the staff are on hand not to sell the plants but to prevent visitors making off with their most choice specimens.

If you want to buy plants, or enjoy more space, the Hampton Court Palace Flower Show in July, which is now up to Chelsea standard, is the place to be.

Then there’s the cost of the food and drink.  There may be 35,000 sandwiches and 110,000 cups of tea sold each year but my advice is to take your own.

But the one thing that people seem to forget about the Chelsea Flower Show is exactly that – it’s a show. As William pointed out, nothing is quite real. The spectacular daffodils have all been in the cold store for many weeks. The show gardens, with their intricate designs, complicated and sometimes spectacular water features, are built in three weeks and dismantled in seven day. So rarely will a show garden replicate exactly a real life home garden. But in my five years talking with visitors to the London Evening Standard-sponsored gardens when I was their Gardening Correspondent, the most satisfying comment (apart from “Congratulations on the Gold Medal”) was, as they pointed to one feature or one piece of planting: “We could do that at home, what a good idea”.

And that’s what the show is about – ideas. Whether it’s a single plant or a plant combination that visitors have never seen before or the pattern of bricks in a pathway, everyone goes home with ideas they can adapt for their own garden.

There’s more about Chelsea on my own blog, TransatlanticPlantsman.

Photos by Graham Rice, from top:  Bowden Hostas, 600 Days with Bradstone, Queen at Burnham Orchids, Chris Beardshaw Garden, South West Carnivorous Plants,  Fetzer Sustainable Winery Garden, Sweet pea 'Promise,' Walker's Bulbs. Click to enlarge.

Comments

[Amy Stewart]

May I just say that it totally rocks that none other than Graham Rice is here guest blogging from the Chelsea Flower Show? Damn.

[william]

I went on Tuesday this year and as always fascinating, a wonderful experience as always. The show is changing but I suppose it must evolve. Trade stands seem to have taken the place of some of the small gardens, pity. However the standards as Graham points out are exemplary. I am slowly sorting out photographs that were taken on the day - it does take time and I do actually garden each day! Bear with me, more will be added each day.
http://www.mygarden.me.uk/chelseaflowershow2007.htm
Hope it gives a flavour of what Graham is describing.

[Graham Rice]

That's an amazing collection of Chelsea pictures, William. Congratulations! Please, everyone, go take a look at this comprehensive record of the Show.