The Chelsea Flower Show Special | Step-by-Step Gardening | Episode 14

Welcome to this Chelsea Flower Show special of Step-by-Step Gardening with me, David Dominey, at Blue Diamond Garden Centre's Bridgemere Show Gardens, but also at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. Coming up, this is where the Chelsea magic happens, an exclusive glimpse behind the scenes of the Blue Diamond Nurseries. The show must go on, a tour of the gardens that have a new life at Bridgemere, and some Chelsea gardening tips. The Bridgemere Show Gardens are closely linked to Chelsea because here you can see five medal-winning Chelsea gardens recreated to inspire visitors. Let me take you on a tour. First Chelsea garden you'll see at Bridgemere is the Cottage Garden, and this was the start of everything. Bridgemere was owned by renowned nurseryman John Ravenscroft, and he designed this garden here and created it at the 1988 Chelsea Flower Show. It did incredibly well, winning not only the gold, but also a Best in Show trophy. And at the end of Chelsea, he collected the whole garden up brick by brick, plant by plant, and rebuilt this garden here at Bridgemere. Without John, there would be no Bridgemere Show Gardens, and without Chelsea, the show gardens wouldn't look like this. John's Chelsea Cottage Garden told a story of an ideal country garden. With its informal and dense planting, this nostalgic feeling garden is productive and beautiful, but also has those domestic touches that make it feel homely. Now the cottage originally was an old pigsty, and really the whole concept of the garden was working people working the land. And the garden itself is a combination of ornamental plants and productive plants too, effectively the best use of all the space. Come summertime, the garden reaches a crescendo of gorgeous bright blooms, with competition quality fruit and veg growing alongside. A picture-perfect cottage garden, loved by insects and wildlife. Now this garden here has been maintained by the Bridgemere Show Garden team over the last four decades, and it still remains very true to its original design. And I've got to say, it is well loved by all the visitors. The next Chelsea Flower Show Garden here at Bridgemere is in fact a folly of a folly. Nestled in an emerald green woodland, this ruined castle is in fact a replica of a fake castle, the Mow Cop in Cheshire. And a stunning centrepiece to this Chelsea gold medal winner. The folly garden, or this green and pleasant land, was designed as an idyllic retreat, reclaimed by nature. And at Chelsea, the garden came complete with a moat, reclaimed stone, and a combination of woodland, meadow and grassland. And once again, the garden was brought back stone by stone to be recreated lovingly and gardened here at Bridgemere for 30 years. Now this Chelsea Flower Show Garden, compared to the cottage garden, has evolved over the years. Okay, the structures remain the same, but the planting has changed. In spring, we've got these azaleas and rhododendrons and a gorgeous ceanothus in the background there. But seasonal plants have been put into the garden as well, giving it an all year round interest. But despite those changes, what this garden has really retained is its magical atmosphere and timeless appeal. This garden's got a lot of personality, it feels as if I'm in a fairy tale, like I've just walked through a wooded area and stumbled upon a castle. It's so incredibly enchanting. Fast forward from the 1990s to today, and Bridgemere is now owned by Blue Diamond Garden Centres, who also create Chelsea Show Gardens. Its CEO is Alan Roper. It is the gold cup of gardening. The sheer creativity, the attention to detail, people are just walking around with their mouths open. I mean, you know, it's a real showstopper. And is that why you've chosen Chelsea to be the venue for this new Blue Diamond Garden? Yes, and to be a part of it, I'm quite proud. And now we've come into the marquee, which enables us to do a garden. The only way we can do a garden under the marquee, as you'll know, is if you're a grower. But because we are growers and we grow a lot of plants, we grow seasonal bedding, shrubs, alpines, everything that people will see in the garden this year is all grown by Blue Diamond. This is your most ambitious garden to date. What can we expect to see? We'll be the only large garden, equivalent to roughly a show garden in size, where the people at Chelsea will be able to walk through and participate in the garden and enjoy the garden rather than traditionally viewing it over a rope. So first, they'll enter the thrive, not just survive, which is the sort of dry area where plants in very dry conditions would actually thrive. After that, there's the tropical plant house, which will be a polar opposite, obviously, of what they've just experienced. And they'll be able to hear, but not see at that point, a distant waterfall. And then once they're through that, then there's this little coppice with things like some white birch and corn and some aces. And then once they leave that, they go through this sort of tracheous burner march, and then they're confronted by this sort of vertical edible wall of fruit and veg. And then from that, they're into what we're calling the terrace garden, rather than the cottage garden. It's more of a contemporary take on a cottage garden. And then there will be, it's like you're in a wall garden, so the walls will have climbing roses and other plants. So it'll be a real lovely experience, but through different zones. How important is it to you to have an immersive garden for the visitors? I think that goes straight to the top of the list. It's always slightly frustrating if you're a gardener, to be behind a rope and not being able to walk in. And when you look in those gardens, you see people with special invites walking around, you think lucky them. Well, everyone at Chelsea can walk through and experience it. To create this magic space where the visitors can actually walk through and enjoy a garden in Chelsea is quite unique. Growing plants for a Chelsea show garden is no mean feat. You need thousands of plants, and they all need to be perfect. To learn more, I've come to see behind the scenes of the Blue Diamonds Three Shires Nursery in Gloucestershire. This is where all the plants with the Chelsea Flower Show garden have been collected and cared for. There's a vast range of plants here, but as colourful as it looks, all of these have been grown in the UK. And that's the job of Blue Diamond Nursery managers like Dave Fever. Anything grown in the UK obviously is going to survive and grow well in the UK. It's a sustainable thing as well. You're not carting it halfway around the world, it's not using up a lot of energy, a lot of resources. It just makes for a much more sustainable, realistic situation really. And why have these particular varieties been chosen for Chelsea? To some extent it's the time of year, so you're obviously going to go for things that are going to look good in May when Chelsea's on, but it's things that gardeners can use in their own gardens and be fairly confident they're going to be successful. So as a nursery manager, what impact does it have on you when they give you a plant list? Once the planting list is decided, it's then down to people like me as nursery managers to produce these plants and we might be growing five, six hundred of one thing and we may only take two or three to Chelsea, but we'll choose the best and those are the ones we'll show to the public. But of course then the rest will go into the garden centres and that's when the public can then buy those plants. As well as the smaller plants, there are also larger feature trees and on the plan this tree is number one, so it's going to be the first big plant that you see as you enter the garden and it's a gorgeous one, Yucca Rostrata. Lovely silvery blue, young palm-like foliage at the top, which when it gets older is cut close to the stem and that's how you get this gorgeous reptile skin effect to the stem. Until now, the plants have been carefully nurtured here to look at their very best and for the past few months that job has been keeping Mikko Moran on his toes. We've been receiving deliveries until a week prior to this, so some last minute adjustments and additions depending on what is or isn't looking good in here, you know, because we we only want the best for show. So how tall were these roses when you got them? I think no more than four feet, so we've managed to get quite a lot more height on them since then, you know, we've really pushed them hard. What tricks of the trade are you using with some of these plants? I'd say the main thing is consistency. You need to be feeding at regular intervals and stick into that and inspection. You cannot manage what you don't inspect because if you don't catch those bugs early there's nothing you can do to save that plant and regular monitoring of temperatures because if it gets too hot you've got to get those doors open, you've got to open the sides, you've got to ventilate. If it gets too cold you're shutting it all again, so you're always looking to maximise, you know, optimal growth conditions. Now I've seen the size of the space that the garden's going into and it's smaller than the space with all of these plants. What sort of percentage of the plants are going to end up in the garden? We estimate about 60% is going to make it. Everything gets squashed in, much denser than you actually would in a domestic setting, but that's just about getting impact and filling every square inch with foliage. This is something you don't see that often, you're growing veg in pots for Chelsea. That's got to be a challenge on its own. It is, certainly when you're only six or so more feet away from rabbit warns next door, believe it or not, you couldn't pick a worse site to grow lettuce in. I can see one, I can see a hole just there. Have you lost any due to rabbits dining? Touch wood, no. We've had a rabbit in one night, we did chase him out in the morning and he was kind enough to leave it all alone. Well you never know what challenges pre-growing plants for Chelsea will give you. It's certainly not, no. Today it's all hands on deck as the plants are being packed for London. Some of them are huge prize specimens. Just take a look at this beautiful tree. It's an Acer Dissectum Inabashidari. Look at the size of it. But there's one really big challenge. Inside the Grand Pavilion, where this garden is being built, you are not allowed to sink a spade into the ground. Everything has got to stand on the surface of the grass. And here's the challenge. Look down here. How are they going to hide that giant pot? Stage one of the Chelsea Flower Show garden, other than the design, is growing all of those plants to prime condition of flower and foliage. But then another bit of jeopardy. Getting it all into the lorry and from the nursery in prime condition, keeping them all looking good, right until it gets to the Thames by the hospital garden, where they're taken in and the garden is then created. So most of the plants that you see here, the next time you see them, will be at the Chelsea Flower Show in the garden looking at their best. Among the show garden plants will be many houseplants, my favourites. I love houseplants and they've become incredibly popular over recent years. And it has been scientifically proven that houseplants reduce stress, can uplift your mood and they can also increase your performance. Let me give you a guide on some of the best houseplants to keep that aren't too difficult. Now here is a really good starting plant. This is Sansevieria. There's a couple of common names, the snake plant, because of the way the foliage looks, but also mother-in-law's tongue. It's a cheeky name, I think, but it's incredibly easy to keep. It originates from Africa in very difficult growing circumstances, blistering sun, tough rocks, hardly any water or food. So when it's potted up in compost and put on a windowsill in someone's home, it thinks it's in heaven. And then there's these little ones here, this stick-like one with an eruption of green foliage and this little tiny rosette one. In fact, for the stick one, there's even this one here. This is a common name as witch's fingers. Witch's fingers? Mother-in-law's tongue? I don't know what they're trying to say here. I have to say, they're that tough. If you don't leave them sitting in water, I think this plant will last longer than its artificial version. Now this is an incredibly popular house plant in the mid-area care section. It's the lovely spathiphyllum, otherwise known as the peace lily, and it does feel very peaceful too. It's the pure white space, as you can see just here, it's a modified leaf. And then there is the central spike there where the very minute flowers appear, just on these little pimples here. Now it originates from Central America and it prefers a humid climate, so a bathroom again does particularly well. But the secret is, is it doesn't like draughts. Easterly window is the ideal location, but the best thing about this plant is it's pretty resilient and it can help educate you on watering house plants. If you miss a water, the whole thing collapses down, but then when you water, it reanimates pretty quickly. So it'll give you an idea of the regularity you need to water and how much you need to put in as well, and providing you don't let it sit in water, this will perform for years and years. And moving up a little bit with the care, it's the calatheas, and just look at the gorgeous foliage here. And for interior designers, this particular plant category is a dream. The markings there, beautiful burgundy on the underside of the leaves as well. The secret is with these plants, remember where they come from, South America, you know, tropical rainforests. So they're growing along the base. So there's a bit of tree canopy, so they don't get too much sunlight. So don't bang it on a windowsill in blazing sun, put it into a brightly lit windowsill, but not direct sunlight. They also used to a great deal of humidity in the rainforests. So what I would do is put them in a position like a bathroom or a kitchen, or occasionally miss them or put them on a saucer with a bit of gravel and water in. So as that water evaporates, it creates a humid climate and these become a real choice for a stunning effect. Now an incredibly popular flowering house plant has to be the orchid. Now this particular variety here is called Phalaenopsis and that's ancient Greek meaning moth-like, because the flowers actually appear to look like fluttering moths. It has the foliage at the base and it sends up these tall spikes of flowers, you know, with the right feeding and conditions you can get up to three flushes of flower in one year. And the secret is, is when it finishes flowering, you follow it down and see these slight bumps on the stem, these nodes, you can cut them to the two or three from the bottom and there's every chance you get a side spike with additional flowers. Now they're epithytes, which means they live on the side of other trees and the like, and as you can see, the pots of these orchids are in fact clear, and that's to let the light in, because as you can see the leaves are green, which helps them photosynthesize, but look at the roots, they're green as well, so both of them are taking in light and helping the plant make food. And the secret is, with the roots, see them as a feature. In fact, some of the roots, if they go slightly silver, it means the plant needs watering. If they're green, it's usually a guide that they're pretty well watered. Never let orchids sit in water and use natural rainwater rather than water from the tap, and these plants you'll have for years and years with an abundance of beautiful flowers. Down at Chelsea, boots are on the ground building the Blue Diamond Show Garden. They've just got three weeks to build a whole garden, and remember, no digging, it's tough, so while the team cracks on, let me show you around more of the Bridgemere Chelsea Gardens. In 2021, Blue Diamond made their first appearance at Chelsea with this show garden, the Forge Garden. Built around a thatched blacksmith's forge, inspired by Branscombe in Devon, the garden depicts a woodland setting with gentle burbling stream around which are edible and medicinal plants plus wildflowers. The paths are cobbled and the metalwork nature inspired. There's some real storytelling here, it feels like the smithy has just left and could be back at any time. And other than the stone, the coals at the back and the metal, the plants are also telling a story. Take a look at the foliage here, almost flame-like from the ferns, and if you think about the warmth of the embers in the hearth picked up here, and the colour of the foliage of the berberis, this one red and this one purple, and of course what about the flash of the smelt that's picked up both in orange and red from the beautiful geum flowers. The feel of this garden matches the ethos of many show gardens here at Bridgemere, favouring naturalistic planting and meticulous attention to detail. This is a little piece of Devon, transported to Cheshire via Chelsea, conveying a place in the world and a time gone by all encapsulated perfectly in the garden. Next door to the forge is the Octavia Hill Garden from 2024. This was Blue Diamond's first large show garden at Chelsea and it was a showstopper. Imagined on an urban brownfield site, this beautiful plant-filled community wildlife garden is designed to help with physical and mental and social well-being. It's hard not to feel good in this garden that's rammed with colourful plants accompanied by the soothing trickle of water running down the stream to a wildlife pond. The watchwords of this garden are biodiversity and helping people to reap the benefits of nature. This garden here is the exact same size as it was at the Chelsea Flower Show and every feature and layout design has been replicated here. All these plants here, the theme itself was to attract wildlife into the garden, bringing people closer to nature and even the features like the wood on this bench, you just want to touch it. Again, it's about connecting people to their natural world. The garden is built as a series of open-air sitting rooms, each with a different view and atmosphere, and the observation deck offering an overview of the garden where you can watch pollinators feast on the nectar-rich plants. It's designed to be explored and enjoyed. This garden was very popular at the Chelsea Flower Show, winning two very special awards, the People's Choice and the Children's Choice, so it's very fitting that this garden lives on after the Chelsea Flower Show here at Bridgmere Show Gardens for many more people to enjoy. Chelsea Flower Show is known for its inspiring garden designs and spectacular plant displays but did you also know it's also a nickname for a method of pruning? It's called the Chelsea Chop. You do it around when Chelsea Flower Show takes place. It's a process where you cut back certain taller herbaceous perennials for three main advantages. Less floppy nature of the plant, tougher, stronger growth, better flowers and longer lasting flowers too. And there are three ways to do it. Let me just show you on this one here. It's ever so easy for the basic Chelsea Chop, cut everything in half. Literally follow the stem down roughly to about halfway and where the leaves join with the stem, angling down, cut half the plant off and follow it all the way with other sections here just keep cutting them back. From there just underneath the leaves there's a couple of buds and these stems will grow effectively doubling up the amount of stems in the heart of the plant so they can lean on each other and you get a stronger plant. And as they grow you effectively get flowers on the tips of each of those so the whole plant doubles its flower production. Now with this next herbaceous perennial, this is a Salvia, that was an Apeta, I'm going to do the second Chelsea Chop method which is just cut alternate branches down by half. Same process as before, you can see the two side shoots that are coming out, I'm going to take that one off. Don't worry if a flower has already formed because these two little side shoots here are going to grow and they're both going to have flowers on. So this way if I take alternate ones off, the ones that I haven't cut back they're going to flower earlier and then the ones I have cut back they're going to flower later so it's double the bubble. Now the Sedum here are also pretty good for the Chelsea Chop, they're a much later flowerer which is great for pollinators. So what I'm going to do because I've got one, two, three plants here, I'm only going to do the Chelsea Chop to the first one therefore the two at the back will flower earlier and create a great display and as they're finishing this one will start. I'm lengthening the flowering season which is great for me and the bees. Same as the others I'm just cutting them where the leaf joins the stem just above. My advice to you is to be bold, don't cut it by a little amount, actually cut it down by half and also don't be late, do it towards the end of May when Chelsea's on and finally once you've given it a cut back always make sure it's well watered. Chelsea Chopped! Fancy getting the Chelsea look for your garden? We've got 50 pounds of gift vouchers up for grabs, we're giving away five gift vouchers each worth 50 pounds. Entering is completely free, click on the link in the description and leave a comment below on the gardening topic you'd like me to cover in a future episode. Open to UK and Channel Ireland residents only, closest to 28th of May 2026 at 11.59pm, terms and conditions apply. But now with the pots cleverly hidden behind plants, under moss and behind rocks, the Chelsea garden is ready to reveal. The team are adding the finishing touches to the garden and I can take you on a grand tour. Now when people visit Chelsea this is the first part of the garden they're going to see and it's nice to see an old friend, the yucca that we saw at the nursery was on the plan to be one of the first plants but guess what? It's only just started to flower but take a look at the garden, this is the dry section of the garden where every plant tolerates, you know, extreme weather like heat and drought and it's all about combinations, this giant pine that's in the centre here, you've got the foliage with the beautiful blue from the eucalyptus behind, it's not all about flower colour, it's about textures, it's about shades of green and blue that individually look great but as a combination look fantastic and if our gardens do have to experience more heat and more amount of time without water these are the type of plants that are going to do really well. This is the start of the immersive part of the garden where you can actually walk all the way through it and as soon as you're in it's quite a wow, a unique experience, you're literally enclosed with plants, this is the house plant section and if you take a look up high it's of foliage here and of course a huge living wall of house plants, a combination of both foliage and flower all together. We normally see house plants at home, individual pots on a windowsill but here they're all together and just like the dry garden it's about combinations of different shapes of foliage, one offset against the other, different textures as well, it's really just a collection of what house plants would look like effectively in the wild growing as a jungle, yet it's achieved in one small space, what a great start to the garden. Tropical house plants, you walk into an atmospheric jungle inspired landscape where you are transported into a tropical feeling space complete with gentle waterfall and textural foliage plants which then gently transitions into an area of more dappled shade with aces, shrubs and ferns. Chelsea Flower Show gardens are all about detail and in that detail there is true inspiration, shady spot, don't let it go bare, choose plants that thrive in it and underneath this tree fern here there's a beautiful combination of different textures of foliage, the ferns here, the upper medium and also look at this here the pachysandra, so an area that's left in the dark suddenly becomes a feature on its own. The next steps along this winding path take you through richly scented arches draped in star jasmine and out into a courtyard garden. Now this is a vertical edible garden, I mean we've all got walls at home, side of the garage, the shed, the back of the house but here the planting has gone upright, there's a series of connecting containers here that enable all of these plants to grow together and it's a pure sensory experience because I can smell the as I sit down, the texture and the touch also works and the different colours and the textures of the foliage as well but it's also a forage wall enabling us to to eat from it, there's fruit there from the strawberries, there's herbs and of course there's lettuce, so fruit, herbs and veg all in one space, it's a sensory feast. There's very few exhibits at the show where you actually feel as if you're inside a real garden and this one, because you can walk all the way through, is so very immersive. This final section here, it's very cottage garden like, it's the tapestry of plant section, it's very bold blocks, drifts of flower colour and a combination of both herbaceous perennials and shrubs and trees all in one space and there's some real special varieties, this is a brand new tree, this is a cherry tree and it's called Japanese Lantern, look at the gorgeous flowers underneath. I've got to say this is my favourite part of the garden, there's something very special about the huge blocks of flowers and the sweeping path, what a treat. It's beautiful, it's beautiful and what do the creators think? I caught up again with Alan Roper and garden designer Peter Dowell. So what was the brief Alan gave you in creating this garden? To bring the Blue Diamond excitement to the Chelsea Flower Show in a 16 by 16 metre plot and how we can pull together the huge range of plants that are available in the stores in a succinct manner at the show, so it connects with everybody. So what was the biggest challenge in creating this garden? I think the working different plant zones is to bring some theatre to it, to be actually within the jungle, within the house plant mix or within the woodland or out here, that was the biggest challenge because you've got the different zones, different planting areas and it's where you change from zone to zone, how that how that works in reality. So now you're in the garden, do you think that he's accepted the challenge and created what you had in mind? Well the best way I can describe it, when I turned up this morning and I walked onto the garden I got emotional and then no sooner did that happen I saw him and then I gave him a big man hug. It's a garden that you just have to walk around it so many times and what's great about it is and part of the brief was I wanted to cover all the climatic zones there are, so we've got the dry arid through to tropical and everything in between, so my favourite is the garden as a whole. Now there's a heck of a lot of effort gone into this garden, not only in building it, producing, growing the plants and the financial commitment as well. Was it all worth it? Absolutely, absolutely without any question and we're going to keep coming back aren't we Peter? Certainly are, I mean we've absolutely nailed Blue Diamond right in the centre of the pavilion, it's our space so we'll keep it. Tuesday was medal day this week and I can proudly reveal that this garden won a gold medal. This medal is the icing on the cake for what has been a feat of creativity, horticulture and sheer hard work. Well done to the team. Well that's it for this episode from Bridgemere Show Gardens to here at the Chelsea Flower Show with the Blue Diamond Garden Centre Garden. Why not subscribe to this channel for more great content like this and a brand new episode of Step-by-Step Gardening will be out next week full of inspirational seasonal ideas. Thanks for watching, enjoy your garden.