And the winner of the much prized People's Choice Award for Chelsea 2021 is…
The Yeo Valley Organic Garden, designed by Tom Massey, supported by Sarah Mead of Yeo Valley.
This is Chelsea's very first 100% organic garden and that fact, combined with the show's move to September meant that plans had to be made and remade many times on this garden's journey in to life.
But it seems that all the hard work has paid off!
We first got 'up close' with Tom and Sarah's vision for the garden at our Reader's Day event at the Yeo Valley Organic Garden. There the team spelt out their vision for the garden and the difficulties in making it happen.
The garden's organic element was vital as the perfect fit alongside the habitats and plants found at Yeo Valley’s family-run organic farm in Somerset. Therefore themes of soil biodiversity, support for pollinators and promoting the many benefits for organic gardening avail throughout.
The show garden features chunks of biochar – charcoal logs from Yeo Valley’s woodland, used as an ingredient to enhance the nutrient and moisture retention of their compost – which provides an arresting black foil to the greenery around it.
A front-to-back stream provides water while the woodland features fruiting and flowering trees alongside silver birch, hazel and hawthorn with retaining structures planted with mixed native hedging.
And there in the middle – suspended from steel – is a steam-bent oak hide, handcrafted into a perfect egg by Tom Raffield. Visitors who get up close can experience the egg from within, being winched upwards to admire the stream below through the egg’s glass floor.
Here – in a video from our Reader's Day – Tom spells out the intentions for the garden.
More pics in our gallery below. Congratulations to Tom, Sarah and the Yeo Valley team!
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