We were flying in from Oslo direct to London / Stanstead and stayed in West Hampstead where my daughter lives. This is a nice part of Western London with lots of houses and beautiful gardens along with many parks and public gardens. We therefore were able to do some local “warming up” during the days before the Show should take place.
Expectation was huge after having reading all the information about the CFS at home before we started. We had received so much information from the RHS (Royal Horticultural Society), which is the main exhibitor. We had information on paper and on the Internet, but also in almost every edition of English Garden Magazines we found something about the CFS.
After our arrival in London, daily expectation grew even more when we would watch hours of television from the show (BBC), and we also found online coverage on the Internet. One day, when we were able to watch the visit of the Royal Family to the show, the “Cribble” really started.
Then the big day arrived and to our great relief there was no rain and the weather was fine. We started our day early to be able to get there before the big rush, but most people seemed to have the same thought in mind. When I got inside the gate it seemed as though every place was already filled up.
The Chelsea Flower Show is presented in the grounds of the old Royal Hospital, which today belong to a retirement home for people from public office, like soldiers and officers. It is a very good place for such an arrangement.
The exhibition itself was composed of different “departments” consisting of some parts outside with demonstrations, garden examples with many special and different solutions together with service elements, catering and so on. The rest was erected inside two enormous tents with flower exhibitions.
There was also a separate shopping street, but I did not spend much time there with the exception of the RHS bookshop. Here I bought John Howells: “Trouble free clematis – The viticellas”. The message from Bill Bird has reached Norway as well. I was not able to get it in Norway – and shopping on the Internet is very expensive because of very high postal charges.
There were flowers all over the exhibition, right from the entrance. Clematis was heavily used in every connection.
After some time outside I started to explore the inside area of the two huge tents with all the enormous and imposing flower arrangements. There were flowers and plants of all types and fashions as far as you could see. High and low whereever you looked, it seemed like all kind of plants where represented, even vegetables and potatoes.
I probably concentrated on clematis even if I tried to get an overview of everything – but there was too much to cover completely. Roses for example were very extensively represented, and even hostas – another favourite of mine – and therefore also very interesting for me.
As already mentioned, it seemed quite full of people when I arrived and inside the tents it was particularly crowded. People streamed in all over the place. You did not have full control and you were wise to stay with the stream and not try to go against it. This was not always so easy, so sometimes you had to make the run more than once to reach exactly where you wanted. This also of course made it very difficult if not impossible to be able to take overview pictures because the stands were completely filled up with people. Nerveless, plenty of close ups were taken.
The Chelsea Flower Show must be a fantastic marketing place. It is almost unbelievable the resources that are used to present the different products. This was naturally also the case with clematis. The big and well-known producers and developers of clematis presented exhibitions and displays with flowers and plants that could take your breath completely away. Examples of such presentations were from Thorncroft and from Raymond Evison.
Other Societies may also have been there but as I did not get around to everything and I might not have seen them. Concerning the presentation of the different flowers for instance clematis; this was normally done in one of three ways:
Probably what impressed me most, as a clematis enthusiast, was the fact that clematis had been so well represented in an exhibition like the CFS. This was more than expected and I found it very positive. This may have something to do with the fact that it took place in England, where clematis is very popular, but surely also that the CFS is a major world exhibition with a very big commercial potential. Hopefully this also shows that the interest for clematis is increasing these days.
Very exciting also was the possibilities too see some of the new clematis launchings of the year 2003. This was the case with for instance Hania, Barbara and Julka from Thorncroft and Szezepan Marczynski
But it was probably the huge amount of flowers, plants, garden suggestions, equipment, possibilities and ideas and good expert advice that made you feel completely saturated after the hours of all the activity.
You meet a lot of people that share the same interest among the visitors but also (not the least) among the exhibitors. Therefore you have fantastic possibilities to ask questions and get professional answers on things you always wondered about.
The whole exhibition was therefore a very rich adventure for a clematis addict like me. And my head was filled with impressions as we fought our way through the crowds at the end of the day to find our way back to West Hampstead and a peaceful evening with a glass of wine and taking care of all the memory modules filled with pictures.
You do not need such an experience every year, but during the winter when watching lots of London pictures makes you start dreaming again.
The next day it was back to business as usual, with flying back to Oslo and finding lots of nice clematis flowering in the garden but also to a big mess of weeds and some plants with clematis wilt.
Finn Rosholm
