All week, we'll be bringing you the latest news from the showground: the people, plants and gardens that are making the headlines. |  |
The final countdown - Sunday 21With just one day to go before the start of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2006, there's an atmosphere of feverish anticipation as the Royal Hospital grounds are transformed from building site to showground.  There are flowers everywhere - spectacular drifts of purple and white in the show gardens and crowded in stacked crates around half-built stands in the Great Pavilion. Hundreds of people are racing to get their displays finished and making those last minute adjustments which are the key to gold-medal perfection. Judging doesn't start until tomorrow, but the assessors are already making an initial inspection of those gardens like the Laurent Perrier Garden, designed by Jinny Blom, which are all-but finished. Even so, it's a job to keep the paths of crushed chalk clean, as Jinny says "In the garden, it's a French hillside, but out here it's southern England - and white chalk and muddy boots don't mix!"
 A week of showery weather means it's very muddy and drought is the last thing on anyone's mind. However the borehole, drilled by the RHS at a cost of £45,000 to circumvent the hosepipe ban, has filled two massive underground storage tanks. If the sun does appear this week, watering won't be a problem. Read more about the gardens and the inspiration behind them. | | |
