Time for a trim - Friday 26After a welcome afternoon of blazing sunshine yesterday, the clouds have gathered again for the penultimate day of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. Several of the exhibitors and show garden sponsors are handing out free umbrellas to anyone caught in the rain, though they might not be needed by this afternoon when the weather is forecast to improve.  As it gets later in the week, exhibitors are having to work particularly hard to keep their displays looking fresh and perfect. Celebrity hairdresser Nicky Clarke is joining in this morning by cutting the ‘hair’ of the dreaming girl statue at the centre of The 4head Garden of Dreams – in fact, a shaggy clump of Deschampsia cespitosa.
But for most show gardens, keeping everything perfect simply means replacing any plants in the garden which are looking tired, or in this weather, battered. All exhibitors bring hundreds of spare plants for just this purpose, and after the show gates close to the public in the evening, gardens are brought up to their very best again before the next day. Roses vs sweetpeas - Friday 26Rose growers at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show are celebrating, and sweet pea enthusiasts are licking their wounds, after the rose was voted Britain’s Favourite Flower in a BBC poll yesterday. "We would have been very disappointed if it hadn't won," says Robert Harkness, of Harkness Roses. “No other plant can match it. When you dream about what you’re going to make your garden look like, you dream of the perfume and colour and the romance of roses.”
 Chelsea is in romantic mood this year, and there are no fewer than five stands in the Great Pavilion devoted exclusively to the rose. You can also see roses in several of the smaller displays, like the RHS Rosemoor Garden, and in the Laurent Perrier show garden, which features roses heavily. "The rose is synonymous with so many different things," says Chris Escott, of David Austin Roses. "Historically, romantically, the fragrance, it reminds everyone of their childhoods – it’s just a wonderful plant in the garden."
But for sweet pea exhibitors like Eagle Sweet Peas, one of three sweet pea specialists in the Great Pavilion, the result is inexplicable.
 "Roses are nice, but not as good as sweet peas," says Derek Heathcote, the company’s owner. "Sweet peas are the queen of annuals. There’s nothing better than a sweet pea’s perfume – we’ve had customers coming down here whose mouths drop open when they smell this perfume." Whichever you voted for, you can be sure your choice will be fiercely defended by at least one enthusiast here. And the debate is sure to continue for many years yet.
Floral art competitions - Friday 26 Seven gold medals have been awarded to the floral art exhibitors at RHS Chelsea this year, with the award for best floral arrangement going to floral artist Solomon Leong, from Hong Kong. His extraordinary composition is a striking Asian-influenced sculpture which uses exotic leaves of black Dracaena and velvety green Arisaema to create windswept 'hair' around a red mask. Suspended invisibly on a green bamboo cane, it’s unusually minimalist for today’s tastes – but it caught the judges’ eye.
 Another gold medal winner, Mig Kimpton, said he was "absolutely staggered" by his win. His arrangement of rich red roses, gerbera and lilies, massed on a lacquered black chair, certainly fitted the class title of "A Touch of Drama". However, it isn’t what he planned to do, as he changed his mind and did a complete re-design as late as last Saturday. Although he's competed at Chelsea for about five years, it's the first time he's ever won gold. "It's fantastic," he says. "It’s made the aches and pains and the lack of sleep bearable." The floral art exhibition awards medals to non-professional floral arrangers. It's held in two parts: in the first competition, held on Tuesday and Wednesday, just one gold was awarded, to the Barbados Flower Arranging Society. | 
