Gardening Is My Therapy

Sophie Raworth talks to Nathalie Whittle aboutconquering nerves, breaking the glass ceiling – and what you don’t see happen at Chelsea…

CATCH SOPHIE RAWORTH, 49, presenting the BBC News and you’ll observe a woman who’s cool, calm and collected – neither a hair out of place nor a crease in her blouse. Meet her in the flesh and she tells a very different story. “What you don’t see is me rushing down to do Six O’Clock News and the make-up women shouting, ‘But we need to put some powder on you, Sophie!’” she explains. “The truth is, I don’t want to be too made up because I don’t want to pretend I’m anything I’m not.”

With such integrity, it’s no wonder she’s celebrating 20 years on national news this year, having covered everything from Bill Clinton’s impeachment in 1998 to the Royal Wedding in 2011.

But it’s at this time of year that Sophie makes the transition from hectic newsroom to front the coverage of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show – and it doesn’t faze her. Her mother, a florist, and her businessman father transformed the garden of their family home in Richmond into a show garden, and if you watched Sophie’s episode of BBC One’s Who Do You Think You Are?, you’ll know that green fingers run in the family – her great grandfather once worked in Kew Gardens’ iconic Palm House.

Sophie lives with her husband, property company director, Richard Winter, and their three children, daughters, Ella, 12, and Georgia, 11, and son, Oliver, nine, in London.

BEHIND THE SCENES AT CHELSEA…

When you visit Chelsea, you might think each garden is down to the work of a single designer – well, I’m there when the other 99 people are hard at work!