The Road to Chelsea Flower Show 2019

Sandi Toksvig and Adam Frost kick off the flower show season with a glimpse of what goes into making the the Chelsea Flower Show the most eagerly awaited event in the gardening calendar.

The Road to Chelsea goes from Grenada to Yorkshire and from Brighton to Cardiff by way of a leisurely cruise down the Thames. Sandi, Adam and Gardeners’ World presenter Arit Anderson meet some of the passionate growers, florists and garden designers whose skill, dedication and desire to be the best make Chelsea the most prestigious flower show in the world.

The Road to Chelsea Flower Show 2019

The RHS Chelsea Flower Show, formally known as the Great Spring Show,[1] is a garden show held for five days in May by the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) in the grounds of the Royal Hospital Chelsea in Chelsea, London. Held at Chelsea since 1912, it is the most famous flower and landscape gardens show in the United Kingdom, and perhaps in the world. The show is attended by members of the British Royal Family and attracts visitors from all continents.

Highlights to the Chelsea Flower Show include the avant-garde show gardens designed by leading names with Floral Marquee at the centrepiece. The Show also features smaller gardens such as the Artisan and Urban Gardens.

The first Royal Horticultural Society Great Spring Show was held in 1862, at the RHS garden in Kensington. Before this date the RHS had held flower shows from 1833 in their garden in Chiswick, which themselves had been preceded by fetes. The Kensington Garden was chosen as a site because the flower shows in Chiswick were experiencing falling visitor numbers due to problems such as poor transport links. The Great Spring Show was held at Kensington for twenty-six years but in 1888 the RHS decided to move the show to the heart of London.

The site chosen was the Temple Gardens, situated between the Embankment and Fleet Street, which had a recorded history dating back to 1307 and which were said to date from the time of the Knights Templar. The roses for which these Temple Gardens were famous were alluded to in Shakespeare’s Henry VI Part 1.