Popping my chelsea cherry | thearticle

I have been lucky enough to spend the bulk of this week at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. I can’t pretend to be the most deserving of visitors. For one thing, I’d never been before. For

another, until a couple of years ago, I’d never really thought about gardens, besides liking being in them. I had a yuppie-ish sense that it would be nice to have a vegetable patch one day,

and I knew that some gardens were world-famous for their beauty. But I confess, dear reader, that my interest in gardening only came about to impress a boy. My soon-to-be-husband was

training to become a garden designer when we first met, following in the footsteps of his wonderful parents, Julian and Isabel Bannerman, who have worked at Highgrove, Houghton Hall and

Waddesdon among many other celebrated gardens. I could hardly tell the difference between a poppy and a pelargonium, so thought I’d better brush up. And so began what remains a nascent but

burgeoning love of plants and gardens. I don’t pretend to know much; in fact, I know hardly anything. Experiments growing sweet peas on my windowsill have largely proved unsuccessful. A

blissful stint working at The Garden Museum in Lambeth last summer prodded me further on my way, but I remain largely ignorant. Yet at Chelsea this is an advantage: I went in not knowing

what flowers I ought to like, and so was entranced by all sorts of things that might – for all I know – be unfashionable or impossible to grow. In the great pavilion, I wandered around with

my jaw agape, wondering at the miniature perfection of the bonsai trees, the gleaming vegetables in neat piles, the blousy irises, so shamelessly sluttish. The smells were extraordinary. The

David Austin stand was an assault for the nose, alternately heady and lemony, subtle and brash. Various tropical gardens smelt faintly of decay and rot – in a good way, if such a thing is

possible. I was transported back a season passing a stand of daffodils and highly scented narcissi, then forward one as I caught a waft of philadelphus. And those are just the nurseries

displaying their wares: the show gardens are another thing entirely. I was particularly taken with the Wedgewood garden, designed by Jo Thompson, with its Indian-style arches, serene pools

and dense, feminine planting. The Welcome To Yorkshire garden by Mark Gregory was a miracle of engineering, more like an installation than a garden with its canal lock bordered by a meadow

and a charming lodge, completed by a vegetable garden in miniature. And the Duchess of Cambridge’s RHS Back to Nature garden was full of charm with its brook, teepee and tree house. Away

from the main drag, the Donkey Sanctuary garden by Williams and Prebensen was a delight, with a palette of purples (lavender, aliums, irises) interspersed with wild grasses. All impossibly

romantic. The bees thought so, too, although I worry that they will be discombobulated when all the riotous variety disappears and they are left with an ordinary, though spectacular, London

park again. The grounds of the Royal Hospital are a thing of wonder in themselves. Lime green parakeets dart and chatter above the imposing building, while the scarlet-clad Chelsea

Pensioners wander around peaceably, smiling and nodding like the heroes they are. The gardens are only half the story, though: Chelsea Flower Show is more social than a cocktail party in,

well, Chelsea. Garden designers have a rock-star fame here; a wave of whispers follows Tom Stuart-Smith, Mary Keen and Chris Beardshaw while passers-by are oblivious to Joan Collins in her

heels and dainty skirt suit and Richard E .Grant in a flat-cap. Visitors mingle at the trade stands, buying gorgeous limited-edition hardbacks from John Sandoe Books, voluptuously perfumed

candles from Charles Farris and beautiful re-upholstered gardening tools from Garden and Wood. The queues for food – champagne, Pimms, lobsters – are astronomical, as are the prices,

although one can find a cheese toastie for a mere £7.50 if one knows where to look. Chelsea is a fixture on the calendar of both socialites and garden enthusiasts, and now I know why: it is

the perfect day out. There are beautiful things to look at, people-watching galore and a shopping mecca. As I got back home to Oxfordshire I noticed afresh the frothy cow parsley spilling

out of the hedgerows, clematis scrambling up sun-warmed walls and the creamy white candles of the horse chestnuts. It was more simple, more natural, than anything I’d seen at Chelsea – but,

in its way, even more beautiful.