Live from the Chelsea Flower Show
- Written by Stephan Drew
Is this Gardening or Garden Theatre? Chelsea. The very word conjures up all that is quintessentially English. It focuses on the garden and what could be more British than that?
Chelsea is the jewel in the crown of international gardening and is regarded as the Gold Standard when it comes to tradition and all that’s new in gardening.
Chelsea has a special place in my heart because, in 2001, I was a minor player in a team that went to Chelsea and won a Gold Medal. My role was more about doing a bit of marketing, driving the lorry and putting plants where the plan said they should go in the garden. But as someone that had previously designed a few gardens professionally, and had owned a plant nursery, it intoxicated me. This was cutting edge horticulture and tradition rolled in to one. These days I’m fortunate enough to have a press pass and the opportunity to avoid the crowds, walk in the gardens and view the crowds from the splendour of my vantage point.
So what is Chelsea really about?
Chelsea attracts over 200,000 visitors over a few days. Gardens are built over a few weeks on a temporary site and then ripped down. Planning for each garden can take years. For example this years Monaco garden had been three years in the planning after Prince Albert’s decision to go for Gold.
The preview day at Chelsea is for the press and celebs .. and both flock to the Royal Hospital grounds to see this spectacular. This is one event in the calendar where celebs have to be seen .. even if they have no interest in gardening.
The reason? The media.
The press coverage is outstanding. Pages and pages of coverage in the printed press and on websites; plus hours of TV coverage internationally.
The next few days are for Members of the Royal Horticultural Society and then it is the turn of the public. Tickets always sell out.
But is it gardening?
Absolutely not.
Yes it is about plants and gardens and both look superb. Many a career has been launched or consolidated at Chelsea; but none of it is real. Chelsea is about Garden Theatre.
Let me explain. None of the gardens at Chelsea could exist in reality. It isn’t just about cost, where some gardens can cost up to £1million to design and build. It is more about theatre.
You see few of the planting combinations could exist in a real garden. For example, here we were in late May and yet there were daffodils in full bloom. Decidedly out of season for the UK they were probably grown in the southern hemisphere and flown in. At Chelsea the ability to grow plants in one part of the world and fly them in, to delay flowering by putting them into cold store, or advance flowering by the use of heat and light, means that the four seasons can appear in a single garden on the same day. This is something that we couldn’t create in our gardens but makes for the theatre that is Chelsea.
Diarmud Gavin’s Irish Sky Garden is also a little unusual. Part of the garden is suspended from a crane 26 metres in the air! A great place to watch the crowds and drink Pimms.
Bizarre though this is I love it. I also love the colour and scents that pervade the senses at every turn. In the floral marquee .. you have to see this, forget marquees at village fetes, it is huge … the scent of hyacinths was incredible.
But as much as I like colour, the artificial blue grass in one garden exhibit did nothing for me! What did impress me was the stand that consisted of a temple, elephants and landscape made out of flower buds and petals. Millions had been used to form an exquisite series of sculptures that would survive less than a week. I also loved the tranquility of the Malaysian garden.
Chelsea is also about consumerism. Hundreds of stands vie for the attention and sell everything from plant labels to sculpture. One piece of sculpture intrigued me. It was of a wild boar; just the thing for my borders. The price wasn’t for my pocket though… £17950. You can buy a lot of plants for that.
You could also buy a flight to London, have a week in the best hotels, a ticket to Chelsea every day and still have change to buy a few plants. Chelsea is worth a visit if you are in London in May any year.
Stefan Drew
Chelsea!
