GROWING FOR GOLD

From first-timers to multiple medal winners, we talk to five of the nurseries exhibiting in Chelsea's Great Pavilion this year to find out more about the plans and preparations they are making to ensure a winning display

- ANNIE GATTI

Spires and rare shrubs

The Botanic Nursery

When Mary and Terry Baker did their first solo Chelsea exhibit, some 30 years ago, they featured The Botanic Nursery's rare trees and shrubs, plus the foxgloves that have since become their signature plants. They included species foxgloves that hadn't been seen before at Chelsea, having put them under lights to get them to flower. Ironically, they've rarely been able to have those particular ones in flower since. "Foxgloves are nice and easy to grow in the garden," explains Mary, "but once you put them in a pot and try to force them into flower, even by two or three weeks, they become soft and flabby and susceptible to aphids." It's thanks to Terry's constant nurturing of the 500 or so specimens they pot up for Chelsea that the nursery's romantic exhibits have been awarded Gold medals for many years now.

Since 2018, the RHS has allowed small nurseries like theirs to sell plug plants at Chelsea, which works particularly well for Terry and Mary as they now grow stocky plugs from seed specifically for the show, and it's the right time for visitors to put them in their gardens. "We get the opportunity to speak about foxgloves and share our passion for them. People think they know about foxgloves, that they're biennial and so flower every second year.