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Gardens: Stars of the show
Chelsea win the Premiership and the iris takes top honours. David Overend explains
Irises in all the colours of the rainbow are set to take centre stage at next week's RHS Chelsea Flower Show.
An unprecedented number of designers have picked the striking perennial to feature in gardens at the world-famous show.
The vast choice of colours, the drought-tolerant qualities of certain species and the sheer splendour of the iris has led to designers Tom Stuart-Smith, Jinny Blom, Andy Sturgeon
and Chris Beardshaw featuring the bloom within their gardens
at the show. Several Small Gardens will also include irises, and within the Great Pavilion leading nurseries will showcase the flower.
Andy Sturgeon selected Iris 'Superstition' AGM to feature in The Cancer Research UK Garden for its dramatic impact: the bloom is a deep purple velvety colour and is so dark it is almost black.
Iris 'Superstition', a tall bearded iris, is a hardy, disease and drought-resistant plant, with long blooming in late spring and early summer.
Bearded irises will be growing in the French-themed Laurent-Perrier Garden. These plants thrive in France, as they are lime tolerant and flourish in hot, dry, stony soils. Several hybrids and cultivars of Iris germanica are being used, which garden designer Jinny Blom describes as having "unsurpassed beauty of flower and colour".
Jinny describes the colour range as "fantastic and sometimes very unusual". She also selected these irises as Iris 'Beverly Sills', a big, ruffly, shell pink and coppery bearded iris, and Iris 'Goodbye Heart', an unusual mix of apricot and lavender with tangerine
falls, will be planted with peonies.
Water irises will also feature in the Laurent-Perrier Garden with Iris sibirica 'White Swirl' AGM displayed in a damp area and Iris laevigata var. alba, a beautiful marginal pond plant, growing in water.
Freya Lawson, garden designer of the National Savings & Investments: The NS&I Garden, a small roof garden in the city category, chose iris to punctuate her planting scheme.
Visitors to the Great Pavilion will find an array of colourful irises: black, purple, blue, yellow, orange, red, brown, pink and white bearded irises will be showcased at Cayeux Nurseries' exhibit.
Claire Austin Hardy Plants will also display bearded irises, and Broadleigh Gardens will feature peacock coloured Broadleigh irises. Kelways is not only growing irises for its own exhibit but also for The Telegraph Garden and the Laurent-Perrier Garden, about 2,000 in total.
Wholesaler, Howards Nursery, another exhibit within the Great Pavilion, is nurturing a number of Iris sanguinea 'Snow Queen' for The Savills Garden.
Hats off to gnome comforts
Gnomes, which were nearly consigned to history because of falling sales, have become top-selling British garden ornaments again.
After suffering years of ridicule, demand for gnomes started dipping in the late '90s and sales all but disappeared in the last five years.
But now a light-hearted decision to stock them by Tesco has paid off as they have become their top-selling garden ornament since going on sale a month ago.
Said Tesco gardening buyer Darren Atherton: "Like them or loathe them, gnomes are back and this year they could be making a reappearance in gardens all over Britain.
"We decided to stock a small range of them as a light-hearted trial just to see what the reaction would be, but we were astounded when the demand just grew and grew.
"We had such a small stock that our initial batch sold out in the first week and we've had to re-order three times now to keep up with the demand.
"I think the high demand must either be down to people viewing them as an endangered species and snapping them up for elderly relations or buying them as novelty presents."
Tesco believes one reason for the downturn in gnome sales during the late '90s could have been that their antiquated image was at odds with the start of the technological revolution and the mass arrival of computers, mobile phones and the internet.
They were so ridiculed that they became the target of pranks, with gnomes even being "gnome-napped" and photographed in exotic locations around the world.
n Garden gnomes were introduced to England by Sir Charles Isham who brought 21 terracotta figures back from Germany and put them in the garden of his home in Lamport Hall, Northamptonshire.
Drought-defying African
While other show gardens at next week's Chelsea Flower Show are faced with the logistical nightmare of the hosepipe ban, GardenAfrica is in the lucky position of exhibiting a garden perfectly equipped for dry conditions.
The UK-registered charity is replicating its work in sub-Saharan Africa by building a township show garden at this month's RHS Chelsea Flower Show.
The garden, which was designed with specific attention to water conservation and natural resource management, is entirely sustainable, demonstrating natural techniques for water conservation and distribution.
The spiral design ensures that water radiates from the thirstiest plants in the centre to those which require less, conserving both the energy of the gardener, and water. It also illustrates the collection of essential grey-water from the home, and rainwater harvested from the roof for drinking and irrigation.
The liberal use of mulch is also an effective way of retaining soil moisture – reducing the need for watering.
Designed by Alan Capper, the garden will be brought to life in partnership with Ross Allan, in close consultation with GardenAfrica's training partner, Zimbabwean John Nzira, an expert in natural African farming and sustainable resource management. The show garden design will then return to its African roots where it will form the basis of further training.
GardenAfrica's launch at Chelsea Flower Show will herald the start of five years' work to reduce poverty and malnutrition in Africa by creating 1,001 training and resource gardens across southern Africa. Their planting focuses on counteracting widespread malnutrition and utilises medicinal herbs for treating debilitating HIV-related and other infections. Consideration is also given to specific local traditions and climactic conditions.
Once established, 1001 gardens can yield up to 500,000 new home and community gardens, from which about three million people can reap their benefits. The average cost of sponsoring a garden is only 10,000.
Visit www.gardenafrica.org.uk.
n And talking of Africa... why not start preparing for the 2006 Send a Cow National Organic Bag Garden Competition.
Experience the joy of designing a bag garden while helping Send a Cow raise funds and generate awareness of how organic gardening practices can help African farmers transform their lives.
The first Organic Bag Garden Competition inspired green-fingered Send a Cow supporters to create a bag garden similar to those used by people in African countries, to make the best use of water and space.
Winners were invited to the final day of the National Amateur Gardening Show at the Bath and West showground where Tommy Walsh of BBC's Ground Force presented them with their prizes.
Send a Cow was founded in 1988 in response to a plea from a Ugandan bishop. The country had been devastated by a long civil war: people had lost their homes and cattle, and milk had become a luxury that few could afford.
A group of Christian farmers based mainly in the West Country decided to send not milk, but long-term help in the form of cows. The first plane-load of 32 in-calf heifers left Gatwick Airport in June 1988. With the help of local church groups, the cows were distributed to poor women who were also trained in caring for their animals, and offered low-cost veterinary services. By 1996, Send a Cow had flown more than 300 cows from the UK to Uganda, but the BSE crisis in the UK prompted the charity to change its strategy – livestock is now bought in Africa.
Download an entry form from the Send a Cow website www.sendacow.org.uk/baggarden.pdf Deadline for entries is July 31 (June 30 for schools). For further information, visit www.sendacow.org.uk.
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