Royal Horticultural Society - RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2008

Leeds City Council come to Chelsea 2008 for their sixth appearance and this year Designer Denise Preston and her team will be ensuring that we never forget that Chelsea is a flower show and that plants are the real show stoppers as far as the visiting public are concerned.

‘The Largest Room in the House’ will commemorate 90 years since the end of World War I with the inspiration for the garden being the garden at Talbot House in the Belgian town of Poperinghe. The garden provided an oasis of peace and calm for soldiers to rest between periods of trench warfare. Predominantly calm, serene, pastel coloured plants have been selected for the central area with the outer beds taking on slightly stronger hues.

Some 8,000 plants will be used with major players including Stipa gigantea, Agastache ‘Black Adder’ and Acer palmatum ‘Bloodgood’ promising to stun, Salvia argenta and ‘Papaver rhoeas’ - the instantly recognisable global emblem that is the Flanders Poppy.

Stipa gigantea will be planted up alongside the two entrances to the garden and will be inter planted with Alliums, Salvia and Artemisia. Agastache ‘Black Adder’ will be situated in two beds that flank a summer house, while designer Denise Preston has chosen Cynara cardunculus – the stately Cardoon – for its architectural and majestic characteristics.

Most of the plant material will be grown by the City Council’s own gardeners and when the show is over ‘The Largest Room in the House’ garden will be relocated in a prominent location in the City of Leeds for permanent commemoration to those who fought in t

During the Great War men from Leeds and the surrounding area served in regiments and battalions such as the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry and the Leeds Pals. City women served in a number of roles including working at the Barnbow Munitions Factory where 35 lost their lives in an explosion in 1916.

Despite the terrible war, poppies flowered every year in Belgium and Northern France, moving Canadian Armed Forces doctor, Col. John McCrae, to write the poem “In Flanders Fields”.