Gardens
Hype is a four-letter word
Ursula Buchan gets into training for next week's Chelsea Flower Show
For the true gardener, Chelsea Flower Show can be very annoying. It is not just the crowds. For one short week in May, our private horticultural preserve becomes the property of the rest of the world, to use as they will, to trample on if they like. News of the show spills over on to the style, fash- ion and gossip pages of newspapers and even trickles into television reports. Hype, as even the most unworldly of gardeners knows, is a four-letter word.
Little wonder, therefore, that there is such pressure on the Royal Horticultural Society both to let out every centimetre of space and not to restrict crowd numbers unduly. That means, of course, that those of us who attend in comfort the other, cosier shows run by the Society must both fight with sharpened elbows for the chance to see what is going on and adjust to the enormous variety of it all.
Take the outside 'gardens', for example: those which are laid out round the mar- quee and on the rock garden bank, next to the Embankment. Every garden designer who can find a concrete block manufactur- er, DIY superstore or charity as a sponsor will be there. This year, there will be a record 29 such gardens, six more than in 1990. Twenty-nine? Most gardeners would not expect to absorb properly the atmo- sphere, design and contents of more than two or, at a push, three gardens in the space of a livelong summer's day.
These are small gardens, it is true, and usually very tightly themed. This year, as `Are you enjoying the popcorn?' coincidence would have it, there will be no fewer than five gardens devoted to the hor- ticultural needs of the disabled or infirm. Although this is an aspect of gardening we should all take seriously, Chelsea Show is not the best showcase for it. The RHS makes some concessions to the disabled letting in companions for the wheelchair- bound without charge and providing sight- ed escorts for the blind — but Chelsea suits best the young, able-bodied and tall. I can- not do much about my height and I do not yet consider myself middle-aged, but I have just spent three days clambering about on the eastern fells to strengthen my calf mus- cles sufficiently for the week ahead.
Although the knowledge that the world is looking on encourages some exhibitors towards the flashy and even meretricious, Chelsea Show nevertheles provides many people with a first taste of high-class horti- culture, attractively packaged. They come for what they have been told is the 'magic of Chelsea', and leave with an impression of gardening which may be unrealistic but is undeniably beguiling. They will come again.
Thereafter, they often become progres- sively selective about what they view. They see the point in buying the programme and spending ten minutes sitting on the grass outside, charting a favoured course — say, from ultra-low-volume pesticide applicators via second-hand gardening books and analemmatic sundials to carnivorous plants and bearded irises. (This device is not entirely straightforward as there is little or no reason, let alone rhyme, to the lay-out of the exhibits, particularly in the marquee, and one earns well-directed opprobrium if one disobeys the one-way system signs tacked to the poles in every aisle.) Although I cannot predict as confidently as a PR executive what will be worth seeing this year, I can say, from past experience and the copious pre-publicity, that there are a number of floral displays in the mar- quee which should make a good starting- point for anyone. David Austin's rose nursery will be exhibiting several new `English' roses, which combine the best qualities of Old Roses with the repeat- flowering capacity of the Hybrid Tea. It is a safe bet that the Alpine Garden Society will have an excellently laid out rock gar- den, as will the bulb and alpine nursery- men, Potterton and Martin. Cannington College of Horticulture will exhibit well- grown tender perennials, some bred at the college, if past form is anything to go by. And the Cornish nursery, Burncoose and Southdown, can be relied upon to show you plants that you would dearly like to grow outside but probably cannot.
Chelsea Show is organised on the assumption that, if each visitor spends about three or four hours there, the crowds will be perfectly bearable. Although I have done some of the legwork for you, I expect the 'magic of Chelsea' will ensure that we still all outstay our welcome.
Previous page
