Chelsea Flower Show Tour 2005
May 22-30, 2005
 

May 26, Chelsea for the whole day!

Our day at Chelsea! Every year I am impressed with the quality and variety of gardens ... this year being no exception.

The Chelsea Pensioners Garden took Gold and was Best in Show. The theme was 'Soldiers Dream of Home'. A beautiful garden that I have no doubt brought back many many memories to those that remember what it was like during the time of Dig for Victory. All vegetables were grown by the Royal Hospital Chelsea using a 1939 catalogue. It was designed by Julian Dowle, his 26th garden at Chelsea and 11th Gold.

This year there was a garden from Canada ... it was a chic garden with Julie Zeldin as the designer and sponsored by Team Nova Scotia. 'He wishes for the cloths of heaven' was the theme inspired by a WB Yeats poem. The garden was to be rebuilt at Chester District School in Nova Scotia and organized by Team Nova Scotia. I hope this means that we may see more Canadian designs showing up now. http://www.teamnovascotia.com/pages/1/index.htm

The Lalique Garden was beautiful. Not a large garden and you had to pay attention because you would have missed the panels of Lalique crystal hanging for all the incredible plants it contained. Black, deep crimson, purple and chocolate brown were the colours of the flowers.

The 2005 trends in gardens seems to be wildlife, waste management, food gardens, and working from home with gardens adapting to the lifestyle of people living and working in their gardens. For the first time, peat is being prohibited in staging. Purple and Black are in with the New Black Iris and Black Hyacinth - apparently it cost 150,000 pounds to produce this hyacinth from Holland called 'Midnight Mystique'. If you are into delphiniums like I am, then you will appreciate 'Princess Caroline' a stunner. Just take a look at all those colours on one stem.

There are always new plant introductions and Chelsea is the first place you will see them. Look at the pictures of the peonies, iris, clematis - incredible! I want them all! Dianthus 'Blackberry Ice' is new and a sweet little charmer. Those lilies are to die for and what about the vegetable and flower displays ... this really is the show that every gardener must see at least once. I have been going since 1996 and have never been disappointed.

It cost 10 million dollars to put on the Chelsea Flower Show. The RHS has 300,000 members around the world and they likely will have around 2700 new members signed up at Chelsea 2005. I also had a chance to see the famous Alan Titchmarsh doing his thing for BBC. It's exciting each evening to listen to the recap on BBC of the show. Our only problem has been finishing dinner up by 8 p.m.

Later on this evening Wendy and I went to St. Martin in the Fields Church for dinner in the crypt and then a most wonderful Mozart concert. We were sitting up in the balcony and all you could see was the ceiling and pillars of the church with the music in the background. Magical. If you go take the 6 BP tickets and sit up there..
http://www.stmartin-in-the-fields.org/jserv/home/index.jsp