A bucket list item that did not disappoint.
There are so many beautiful flowers in this world… and many of them were on display today.
The day started as yesterday with a meh breakfast, a trip to Cafe Nero for real coffee (and a couple of early morning excellent instant coffees for me which I’d brought along) then with caffeine levels in the relatively safe range, we were onto the bus for a short ride to the Royal Chelsea Hospital grounds, site of the Chelsea Flower Show. It was raining, but the forecast did say we would have a dry period between noon and 3 p.m. The bus driver had to do a three block loop to get to the right drop off point, and that took as long as getting there did, but traffic was very well managed around the area. Our guide gave us survival guide tips enroute, some of which were helpful and some too late (“no point in taking an umbrella, it’s too crowded to use it”; “wear comfortable shoes”..). I elected hiking boots today as they are more waterproof than my runners.
Off the bus we trotted and were handed our tickets – these cost online 119 GBP for an all day admission, I learned last night during my research. Whew. Champagne and seafood lunch booked for 11:30 another 96 GBP – ha ha. Alison and I had sandwiches and grapes from Waitrose with us, purchased yesterday evening. Alison is as thrifty as I, happily. We picked up programs and headed off to see some of the smaller show gardens, and larger vendors down the first aisle. Not much traffic at first (the show opens at 8 a.m. officially but apparently unofficially @ 7 a.m., like Costco, you can often get in). That would have been me, given my druthers, to avoid crowds… When the rain stopped about 11, albeit it had only been light, the traffic definitely increased. What was neat was that all the vendors had gardens or plants installed, and throughout the show it was amazing to see that they all looked like they had been there for years, rather than at most a couple of weeks. Transplanting techniques are obviously very advanced.
Royal Hospital Chelsea
One of many fully dressed Royal Chelsea pensioners enjoying cake in the rose booth, aptly in front of the variety “Chelsea Pensioner”
an apropos vendor near the start, with umbrellas
There was everything for sale; many water features, garden furniture, innovative summer houses, sculptures galore… this one had a moving ring of water as well as water running down the middle. Unfortunately the video isn’t supported on this site – it was really lovely.
gorgeous greenhouses and cold frames for sale here
Lots of very quirky sculptures
and familiar ones…
A tree fountain
not your usual garden furniture, but only 10,000 GBP at the CFS (normally 12K). Gorgeous, and comfy.
made of metal, but amazingly comfortable with the seat cover
and if your taste was Highland cows in the garden, there were plenty of opportunities to purchase these!
some modern version included
if your taste leaned to wilder animals…
or perhaps fruit?
All set very attractively amongst beautiful plant arrangements.
We moved to the show gardens when the weather dried a little, and there might have been a caffeine boost in the interim. This is the gold medal show garden; Japanese.
It was a beautiful, zen space (apart from all the people jostling to see it- you had to take turns at the front to take pictures, but people were mostly courteous about stepping back after their turn).
This was a busy place, but not as crazy as the Monty Don dog garden directly opposite. We tried to see it on our first round, but there were people 6 deep and we’d been advised that things quieted down around 3 pm. at the show gardens so we moved on. Three other attempts during the day to get near it, including after 3 p.m., were unsuccessful as there were media presentations and shoots being done every time we were near, and that drew 10 deep as people flocked to watch. Moths to a light…. I never did see the dogpond or the area in front of the bench. The idea of the garden was dog paths through the riotous growth, with a pond to wash the dog, and a summerhouse to retreat to in the heat. What we saw of it was really attractive, but Gary pointed out that he’d planted opium poppies in amongst – no wonder it was a happy (and quiet) dog đŸ™‚
paths for the dog to explore
Lovely colours and dense diverse growth, like Great Dixter
the summer house
getting ready for a shoot – yet again
Seriously, not again??? 5 layers of people oggling the media stuff.
Seeing other shoots happening in the main pavilion, it was interesting to note how much supporting cast and machinery was dragged along to do one of these.
Other show gardens of note:
pathway garden – interesting landscape slatting
and xeroscopic planting
avanade intelligent garden, full of sensors to monitor and appropriately respond to conditions
Hospitalfield arts garden
Enroute to another section, some quirky instillations – pot man and dog
nice way to use a phone booth!
The pavilion was next on the agenda, after downing our sandwiches. There were very few seating areas around so we ended up on the grass. Toilet stops saw long queues but incredibly good management inside such that the lines moved very quickly and the facilities were impressive – I had expected portables but these were flush toilets and very nice sinks, soap and paper towels available. I guess the well dressed would not use a portable – and there were many of these, in stilettos and flowered garb, clearly there to be seen.
The judging had been done the day before, but some exhibits were just getting notified of their wins today.
South Africa captured the best exhibit and was a spectacular riot of colours and forms
We also loved Barbuda and Antigua, with the pink sand and cut shells.
This won in a different category and couldn’t be more different; we had eventually found a seat for coffee with a volunteer from this booth and had a good chat with her about how she got to be a volunteer, then met her later on her shift. There is accomodation on site here (near Kerry) if anyone wants to see the real thing!
This lovely acer won best tree; there were cascades of acers in several spots
The volunteers manning the booths were always happy to chat, and this one below was manned by a Turkish immigrant (here 3 months) who worked in a private plant research facility after some previous work on vertical gardening.
pollinator garden
An explosion of fuscias
Salvias! Almost as good as Great Compton Gardens
Delphiniums… chatting to this volunteer sent us over later to an interesting peat free compost alternative – a former Yorkshire sheep farmer using comfrey and wool clippings for a water retaining compost mixture. The UK and Europe are far ahead of us in preserving bogs and banning peat extraction.
And then there was the section of cut flowers…
Mums
gladioli
lillies
Pinks
Crowds were thick at times and it had a disneyesque feeling with the garbage containers being wheeled out of curtained off areas in the back… all very efficient though.
Having a little rain in the morning really helped keep away some of the numbers, esp the well clad lot.
The section on balcony gardens was fabulous, unfortunately tough to photograph as we hit this section during the busiest time.
flowers, furniture and art on a balcony
block style
cement board planters and 6″ deep blocks on the foot surface for durability
A lot packed into a small space! One could call this a garden of the future as well…
The Japanese small space – functional and zen
Karen with unknown person who stepped into the shot, during the rainy period. I will point out I only drank one coffee at a time, I was holding Alison’s while she took the shot.
There was much, much more but no more room to show it all. And we didn’t see it all either – a huge volume of stuff in a very small space, though it didn’t seem small. Again, astonishing how seasoned the gardens looked considering they were there only a short time. I watched a video on you tube last night which documented the building of one booth; really interesting.
We took the tube home, as we didn’t want to hang around until 6:30 p.m. (we were tapped out an hour before that) and got Indian takeout for dinner. We had trouble ordering on line so I eventually phoned in our order and during pickup the owner was quite concerned to hear the website wasn’t working properly – he threw in a free bottle of beer which we appreciated.
Trial pack tonight to see if I can still get away with only one case – looks hopeful.
Would I go to the Chelsea Flower show again? Those who know me know how much I LOVE crowds. Probably, but wouldn’t come over specially for it and would get there very early. Overall, it was wondrous, the downside being the crowds even on members only day. At least most were polite, different from North America. I would try and book some kind of meal mid day, as there is not enough seating and had the rain continued it might have been miserable trying to find somewhere to park to eat. Happily, the weather forecast was wrong in our part of Chelsea and we had sunshine alternating with clouds but no more rain after it stopped about 11 a.m.
Another bucket list item off the list!