RHS Chelsea Flower Show: five horticultural highlights

The RHS Chelsea Flower Show, a five-day gardening extravaganza – and the pinnacle of the UK's horticultural calendar – is once again under way in London.

King Charles, who became the new Royal Horticultural Society patron this year, toured a number of the gardens with Queen Camilla on Monday. Then the event officially opened to the public on Tuesday with a "touch of horticultural glamour", said the BBC. Among those in attendance were Joanna Lumley, Judi Dench, and Olympian Jessica Ennis-Hill, "who revealed she was attending to try to work out why her wisteria had not flowered for seven years".

More than 150,000 visitors are expected to visit the Flower Show, which has been held every year since 1913, apart from during the two world wars and the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

No adults allowed

The King and Queen found there were no royal exceptions when visiting the "No Adults Allowed Garden", designed by Harry Holding and children from Sulivan Primary School in London. Grown-ups are only allowed to enter if they pledge to plant a tree, donate to the RHS School Gardening Campaign, or find a flower that starts with the first letter of their name.

The royals "duly handed over a posy of flowers beginning with the first letter of their names, camellias, from the Buckingham Palace gardens", said The Telegraph. The royal pair also appeared amused to find themselves dubbed "King of the Compost" and "Queen of the Bees" by the children of Sulivan Primary School. And the King appeared taken with a number of the features – "while a meadow, a slide and a den were among the children's ideas that made the cut, crocodiles were ruled out".

A rainwater harvesting pavilion

This year was hailed by the RHS as its most sustainable show yet and this was in evidence throughout the gardens. The WaterAid garden, which focused on sustainable water management, featuring what it called a "colourful array of plant species designed to deal with varying amounts of rainfall", was among the gold medal winners.

Its "striking centrepiece", said The English Garden, is a "rainwater harvesting pavilion: an 11-foot tall structure that captures and filters every drop of rain, storing it for later use".

A taste of Regency England 

Fans of the hit series "Bridgerton" will have a chance to become the talk of the "ton" and channel their inner Queen Charlotte when visiting the Netflix-sponsored Bridgerton Garden at this year's show, designed by Holly Johnston.

"The secrecy and privacy of the garden [represents] the gossip and scandal of Regency society," said Johnston, speaking to The English Garden. It features a climbing ivy, a moon gate and a three-tiered water fountain.

A garden for 'forest bathing'

Ula Maria won best in show for her "forest-bathing" inspired garden for the charity Muscular Dystrophy UK.

The garden includes "40 birch trees, inspired by the patterns of muscles under a microscope, to create a grove" as well as "woodland-edge style plants such as Melica altissima 'Alba' grass" and a "few pops of colour from mayflower and iris", said The Telegraph. The garden is inspired by the Japanese practice of forest bathing, or "shinrin yoku", which encourages people to meditate on the sights and sounds of the woodland.

An 'edible' skatepark

One of the quirkier gardens at this year's RHS Chelsea Flower Show is an "edible" garden featuring a granite skate ramp as its centrepiece, designed to highlight links between "skateboarding and cultivation" and draw in young people.

"The move may horrify traditionalists who associate skateboarding with desolate concrete parks," said the Daily Mail, but "rather than being a culture clash" its creators hope it will "help to get skateboarders involved in the rarefied world of horticulture and encourage young people to start growing vegetables".