Chelsea Flower Show-may 2019 reflections from down under

When I left New Zealand in mid-May to visit my family in the UK, I hadn't even thought of the Chelsea Flower Show.  But my family had.  Soon after I arrived as part of a significant birthday celebration, they presented me with an envelope which contained tickets for Chelsea.  And not just any old tickets, but invitations to the Members Day and Cocktail Party afterwards!  None of us are RHS members so I was touched and impressed by the hoops my family must have had to jump through to obtain these prestigious tickets.   It was a thrilling day with much to see and take in, only a fraction of which I am able to record here.  I have chosen my  favourite gardens to discuss, but there were other worthy gardens too, which had been awarded gold, silver and bronze medals. 

​M&G GARDEN designed by ANDY STURGEON
Winner of Best in Show and a Gold Medal

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We headed first of all for Main Avenue and the Exhibition Show Gardens where the first impressions were wild, green and natural!  In many of the gardens there was not a lot of colour - the drama relied on textural planting, and clever design.  The simplest and most natural looking designs are of course the most difficult to achieve, and there were 2 of these which I particularly liked. ​ 
​The first of these was the M&G Garden designed by Andy Sturgeon which deservedly won a Gold Medal and Best in Show.  M&G stands for M&G Investments which is the main sponsor of Chelsea, and  who chose Andy Sturgeon as the designer of their sponsored garden.  The aim of the garden was to celebrate the beauty of natures power to regenerate and colonise all kinds of landscapes with new growth.  It certainly did that with it's lush and vibrantly green environment featuring plant species from around the world - many of which had never been seen at Chelsea before. 
Much of the power of this exhibit was due to it's position where it could use borrowed landscape in the form of existing trees already part of the Chelsea site.  Sited against existing mature trees on 2 sides, where the edges of the exhibit and the existing woodland blurred, it created the feeling that the garden went on forever into woodland. 
​This lush planting was divided by and contrasted against black linear sculptures representing ancient rock formations fashioned from massive charred oak.  The regenerative theme was carried through by a series of small pools and streams trickling through the garden.  I am in complete accord with the judges in rating this garden the most powerful and strongest design at Chelsea.

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​THE SAVILLS AND DAVID HARBER GARDEN
designed by ANDREW DUFF
Bronze Medal winner 

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 The second garden I particularly enjoyed was the wild and natural Savills and David Harber Garden designed by Andrew Duff - his first Chelsea design which won a bronze medal.  This was wild and natural taken to the extreme, with plenty of long grass and wild plants of the woodland and countryside verging on weeds i.e. buttercup and cow parsley.   Nevertheless, we all know how beguiling a froth of cow parsley can look! 
​Rather than strong and powerful as was Andy Sturgeons M&G Garden, I was captivated by the ethereal quality of this garden as  light filtered through surrounding woodland into a clearing and a naturalistic pond with the native iris growing in a most natural way in and around the pond blurring the edges.  The plants - weeds and all, were native to the UK, and the  trees  included Alder and Elder. 
​To my way of thinking this was a superb example of a simple and natural design, which would not have been easy to achieve in a Show context and could have stood alone without the sculptural shard-like installation as a focus - a double focus actually reflecting as it did in the pond.  My initial feeling was that this glitzy sculptural element didn't gel with the natural feel of the exhibit.   Or was it  there as a foil to the wild and natural and meant to contrast rather than gel?

​THE TRAILFINDERS ''UNDISCOVERED LATIN AMERICA'' GARDEN
designed by JONATHAN SNOW
​Silver Medal Winner

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Another 'wild' garden I identified with straight away was a southern hemisphere garden - The Trailfinders 'Undiscovered Latin America Garden' -  Made not by a Chilean or Brazilian designer - but by Jonathan Snow from the U.K.   Like Jonathan I had been on a botanical trip to Chile and Argentina some years ago, and his Chelsea garden transported me straight back there.  All the planting was faithfully native to South America, particularly Chile, from the large Araucaria araucana (monkey puzzle) to the herbaceous Alstromeria.  I felt quite at home with this southern hemisphere garden as so many of these South American species also belong to the same plant families as our New Zealand  native species - such as Kauri which is also of the Araucaria family.  And the Chilean Nothofagus antarctica (evergreen beech)  is related to the New Zealand Nothofagus (native beech) and looks very similar as well.   South America's native Fuschia magellanica was represented too,  as we also have our native Fuschia (Kotukutuku).
The red walkway may not have been authentically South American, but it certainly added a visual focus to the exhibit.
Jonathan says 'Understanding where a plant grows in the world and the conditions it enjoys, helps us all become better gardeners and designers'. 
Ain't that the truth??  And the garden won a silver medal so the judges were impressed too.

​THE WELCOME TO YORKSHIRE GARDEN
designed by MARK GREGORY
Gold Medal and Peoples Choice Winner

Monty Don and Joe Swift glimpsed chatting between the working lock and the lock -keepers cottage

A different view of the lock keepers cottage

Another wild and natural garden, the ''Welcome to Yorkshire Garden'' celebrates Yorkshire's canals and the rural drama of the county's industrial heritage.  This exhibit illustrates again the way the existing trees of the Chelsea site, can enhance a design which in this instance aims to strike the perfect balance between the industrial and the beautiful.   Mark Gregory, the designer says ''My design pays homage to the canals and locks which were vital to Yorkshire as the arteries of industry during the Industrial Revolution and how they have been lovingly restored to create a unique ecosystem and valuable leisure resource''. 
​It was very hard to get a good photo of this garden as there were celebrities around  - Joe Swift was interviewing Monty Don in the garden so the  crowds were several rows deep hoping to get a glimpse of the celebs.  And a glimpse is all I could get with my phone camera, as I was squeezed from all sides.  So the photos are less than perfect, however you might just make out Joe and Monty through the willow chatting in front of the Lock-keepers cottage.

​THE R.H.S. BACK TO NATURE GARDEN
designed by HRH THE DUCHESS OF CAMBRIDGE
with ANDREE DAVIES and ADAM WHITE

A childrens teepee hide-away made from tree branches

A robust ladder up which children can climb to the tree-hut

Everybody wants to know about the Duchess of Cambridge's garden!!   It was titled The RHS Back to Nature Garden and was created with the help of designers Andree Davies and Adam White. As an RHS Feature Garden it was in a  class of it's own which was not competitive. 
​Following the theme of wild and natural, it was a like an authentically natural playground for children.   There was no gaudy plastic playground equipment here - oh no - all was created from nature.  The tree-huts, the hidey holes, the swings, the little wooden bridges over little rocky streams, the winding trails and paths were all created from pebbles, branches, logs and rocks.  The  naturalistic planting of woodland and roadside, such as ferns, long grass and wild strawberry, was once again verging on weeds.
The Duchess's vision was to provide inspiration for places for children to be able play, learn and discover about the natural world, and although a charming concept and beautifully crafted, this garden did not convey the sophisticated design principals of many of the Exhibition Gardens.  Nevertheless, the queues to view the garden were endless. 
      

THE GREAT PAVILION

​ To see ''flowers'' and colour ad infinitum, you must head for The Great Pavilion, and there you will see flowers as you have never seen them before.  Flowers from every season - winter Hellebores and the diminutive crocus to autumn Chrysanthemums and everything inbetween.

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​The Great Pavilion showcases some of the best nurseries from Britain and around the world as well as science and education exhibits and impressive displays from U.K.'s finest florists.  More than 80 nurseries were exhibiting their passion for plants and in my opinion there were none more splendid than the Allium National Collection.

This exhibit was a show-stopper where Alliums in flower, leaves, seed-heads and bulbs were all on display.  But it was the Alliums in flower which said it all.  Exhibited in formal rows, their stiff growth habit of a ''globe on a stem'' was accentuated.   This form in many different shades of purple, mauve white and green, were spectacular.   ​Wouldn't we love to have this sort of access to growing Alliums in New Zealand?  They are a rare treat in our country, whereas in the U.K.  you can see Alliums in many gardens.

Yes - these too are Alliums. I had not seen their flowerheads in this lovely tangled form before and sadly know even less about this unusual cultivar.

The impressive centre piece of the Allium exhibit

  

Even the roses were wild and natural.  The David Austin Rose exhibit was rambling and tumbling everywhere.  There were also some more recently introduced formal cultivars, but I didn't feel drawn to photograph them in the same way as I did this more natural wild display, so I'm afraid they got left out!  However I do know that 2 new cultivars were introduced, both of them named after characters from Thomas Hardy novels.  Both of them full ruffled forms - one called ''Eustacia Vye' has a deep coffee apricot centre fading to a lighter pink towards the outer petals.  And the other called 'Gabriel Oak'' is a rich burgundy pink, again with multiple ruffled petals.  But neither variety is shown here.

Harkness Roses exhibit - the deep pink rose in the foreground is called ''This Morning''

The David Austin Roses exhibit which won a Gold Medal

​It's a dilemma at Chelsea because you would like to record the names of many of the different new species and cultivars, but there simply isn't time if you want to photograph the exhibit while there is a rare people-free opportunity. You have to be at the ready with your camera/phone  the minute there is gap in the crowd and if you are busy writing you might miss that gap.  Also there is so much to see that you don't want to spend too much time writing down names, so apologies for lack of names. However I can tell you that the David Austin Roses exhibit won a Gold Medal, and was a special tribute to David Austin himself, who died in December 2018.
The Harkness Roses exhibit, who market their roses as ''easy-to-grow garden roses caught my eye again because of the informality of their exhibit and the roses themselves.   They were mostly single or semi single varieties and many had an attractive dark blotch in the centre, in the same way as the very early species rose  'Rosa persica'.  The sprawling  deeper pink rose in the foreground is called 'This  Morning''  and was truly gorgeous.

Hillier Nurseries Ltd 
Gold Medal Winner

It is not unusual for Hilliers Nurseries to win a Gold Medal.  They are always a prominent exhibitor in The Great Pavilion and have won a Gold Medal every year since 1939.  The excellence and breadth of their designs and plants is unrivalled even though there are always many other interesting, unusual and attractive exhibits in the The Great Pavilion, yet for sheer excellence and professionalism, Hilliers always pulls it out of the bag. 
​And we, in  New Zealand are delighted about this as so many of us remember with affection, Kate Hillier, part of the famous Hillier Nursery family, when she lived in Auckland and managed the Ellerslie Flower Show.

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The Hillier blends together contemporary and traditional themes. The central element, alongside the thousands of beautiful plants, is the striking contemporary water feature that brings a feeling of calm and elegance to the space and is designed to be easily viewed from all angles.  I have been blown away by the largesse of the plant material of Hilliers exhibits when I have been to Chelsea before, especially the way they so effortlessly show plants of all seasons together.  And here it was again with white spring Cherry Blossom in flower alongside summer roses, late summer Hydrangeas with the striking , variegated white and green Cornus foliage.  These were in the white corner of the exhibit where serene white borders transition to vibrant pinks and oranges, moving to hues of purple as you walk around the exhibit.
​ ​The planting designer, Lilly Gomm says “Combining both traditional and contemporary can be a fine balance, but we have made sure the two are seamless. The presentation of a wide variety of Hillier hardy perennials, shrubs and trees, including brand new varieties and classics, is, of course, a vital part of this.”

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Lysimachia purpurea ''Beaujolais''

New foxglove introduction - Digitalis valinii ''Firebird"

  Finally here are two of the many plants which took my eye at Chelsea. In the Hillier Garden I spotted a favourite of mine which I have tried to grow in my own garden - Lysimachia purpurea 'Beaujolais''.  But it never looked like this in my garden!!   Never so fulsome and lush.  The other plant which appealed was a  hybrid foxglove introduced for the first time at Chelsea called Digitalis x valinii "Firebird"   It was well named with it's deep pink pointed beak-like florets set off by unusual red tinted foliage. 

I came away from Chelsea that day filled with wonder and enthusiasm at the Great British Gardening  Culture.  Horticulture and anything relating to gardens are so much part of their way of life - the impeccable design, the excellence of the plant material and new plant introductions, the enthusiasm, the crowds, and the seriousness  with which  horticulture is regarded in the UK is impressive.  It is in their DNA!  
And I couldn't help wishing it was more like this in New Zealand.  There is a garden culture here too, and we do have some great gardens and dedicated gardeners but horticulture here is all too often side-lined for something which is percieved as more important.  There is not the dedication led from above which you see in Britain.