The Balcony and Container Gardens categories returns to RHS Chelsea Flower Show in 2024, with nine small-space gardens.
The category is all about helping emerging designers get to Chelsea. The intention behind the designs for Balcony and Container Gardens is to offer ideas and inspiration for people with limited space and resources. Veteran designer Paul Hervey Brookes is mentor to the designers in this category.
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Balcony and Container Gardens at Chelsea Flower Show 2024
Container Gardens at Chelsea
The Balcony and Container Gardens at the 2024 RHS Chelsea Flower Show aim to inspire gardeners to tackle extreme weather conditions, including gale force winds and rising temperatures.
mgr Changing Tides Garden
Sponsor: mgr
Designer: Lucy Mitchell
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes
Celebrates the tough plants that have adapted to the harsh conditions found along the UK's shingle beaches and can thrive in extreme weather conditions. The focal point for the garden are the clusters of Kent ragstone boulders, hand sculpted into planters. The boundary evokes a coastal groyne made from reclaimed weathered timber and rusty steel detailing. Large planters made from repurposed steel piles, house plants that do not need much watering.
Other gardens at Chelsea
- The full list of All About Plants gardens
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The Water Saving Garden
Sponsor: Affinity Water
Designer: Sam Proctor
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes Sub-Contractor: Castle Landscapes
As rainfall becomes more unpredictable, Sam Proctor has focussed on water conservation in this courtyard garden, showcasing methods to capture, store and re-use water. It features a series of interconnected self-watering planters that are hooked up to the building’s rainwater gutters via rain chains and slimline water butts, and contain ‘self-watering tankers’ that store rainwater and deliver it to the roots by capillary action. Tanker systems reduce the amount of water needed, delivering water right to the roots where it's needed, with less surface evaporation, and with less water stress to plants, they grow more strongly, with denser root systems and healthier above ground growth.
The Anywhere Courtyard Garden
Sponsor: Luxe Unique, Living Walls, ICS Chimney Sweeping Group
Designer: Elisabeth Wright-McCalla
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes
This tiled courtyard was designed to transform an unloved piece of concrete or land into a vibrant and restorative place. At its heart is a central water feature surrounded by a living wall. On either side, trees form a natural canopy of gentle shade. The garden is designed to be modular and practical, with raised beds forming the back of the seating, and built-in storage.
The Ecotherapy Garden
Designer: Tom Bannister
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes Sub-Contractor: Wright Landscapes
Tom Bannister’s courtyard garden promotes the benefits of immersing oneself in nature and reflects the current trend for cold plunge therapy. At is heart is a plunge pool, enveloped in lush, predominantly green planting. A trio of antique waterspouts emerge through the green wall, feeding into a series of pools and cascades. A rill passes through the planting leading into a final cascade, creating a soothing water soundscape. Three Crataegus monogyna multi-stem trees create a canopy.
Sanctum
Designer: Sonja Kalkschmidt
Contractor: Rupert Crowton Rowarth
Sanctum offers an retreat from fast-paced corporate life. The minimal, pod-like sanctuary, easily assembled in a variety of locations, features a striking black charred wood pod at its centre. The pod is made from English larch, charred using the shou sugi ban technique. This traditional Japanese method preserves wood without harmful chemicals and strengthens its resistance to weather and pests. The majority of the plants in the garden have been selected for their green foliage in various textures, with occasional subdued hints of colour.
Chelsea Flower Show 2024: Balcony Gardens
La Mia Venezia
Designer: Michela Trinca
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes Sub-Contractor: Kate Gould Gardens
This balcony garden is a homage to Venice and a celebration of plants that can cope with rising temperatures. The plants showcased highlight how a balcony can have a unique microclimate, allowing more unusual plants such as bougainvillea and citrus to thrive where they may not in an exposed garden. Overhanging plants and a pergola make full use of the space, creating an enveloped outdoor room for the residents while spilling out for passers-by to enjoy.
The Addleshaw Goddard Junglette Garden
Sponsor: Addleshaw Goddard
Designer: Mike McMahon and Jewlsy Mathews
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes Sub-Contractor: Mike McMahon Studio
Inspired by the sponsor’s own balconies in King's Cross, London, the design provides a serene sanctuary from busy city life. The hardy tropical planting mirrors the structural layers of the jungle: the emergent, canopy, understory, and forest floor. The plant selection is a tribute to the husband-and-wife team's global jungle adventures and Jewlsy's ancestral home in Kerala, India. A striking folded back wall, crafted from recycled paper, echoes the jungle’s layers, and the chairs are inspired by the unfurling of young fern fronds. The garden promotes biodiversity with bird nests, integrated bat boxes and a small pond.
Tomie's Cuisine the Nobonsai
Sponsor: Tomie's Cuisine, Alice Garden Design, Takehiro, Niwaki
Designer: Tsuyako Asada
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes
This balcony garden explores ways of reducing water consumption by incorporating a “no-waste gardening" ideas. It includes reusing garden waste such as pruned twigs, stems, weeds, and leaves by cutting them into small pieces and placing them on the soil's surface to retain moisture and using cardboard and newspaper instead of soil at the bottom of pots. This method retains soil moisture, promotes bacteria growth, and enhances mycorrhizal fungi development, making plants healthier and reducing the need for chemical fertilisers and soil cultivation. It also includes a yuzu citrus tree, hazelnut tree, a fig, blueberry bush and kitchen herbs.
Raines Repurposed garden
Sponsor: Children With Cancer UK
Designer: Thomas Clarke
Contractor: Big Fish Landscapes
A shaded seating area provides a place to relax and enjoy soft mostly evergreen planting, including a statement multi-stem yew (Taxus baccata). The garden has many repurposed elements, including the seating and the handmade floor tiles.
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