The final weekend before the judging is when hopefully everything comes together! Everyone works hard to clip, clean, tweak, trim and tidy!
Just in case you can’t remember how it all started – have a look at this time-lapse video made by Jane Sebire.
We’ve done all we can to make the garden the best it can be. Just have to see what the judges say!
The heat is on! 3 days to go until judging and things are starting to fall into place on the New Wild Garden.
Nigel Dunnett is on site planting and finalising the last few details. Nigel is pleased with how the garden has progressed and says that it has exceeded his expectations.
Nigel Dunnett on site planting.
The Habitat Walls are completed and planted – so things are really starting to take shape. Just got to fill the pools now…so more worry as we wait to complete the water features!
Peaceful in amongst the Silver Birch trees...
Progress on the New Wild Garden is coming on – but there’s still lots to do!
Day 13 and the plants have arrived!
Work has begun on the construction of the infill for the Habitat Walls. It’s quite a painstaking job: the metal frames for the walls are filled with materials by hand in random patterns to create a stunning yet practical home for garden wildlife. The materials include recycled wooden palettes, logs, old books and even some fruit!
The Habitat Walls are finished on the tops and sides with paddlestone walling. The stone is cut by hand on site. Bearing in mind there are five walls – you can see there’s a lot to do and there’s only seven days left until judging!
Mike working on the dry stone walling for the Habitat Walls
Meanwhile, the team are assembling the decking for the seating area and in front of the office. Again the deck is made from reclaimed boards, so the wood has a lot of character. The boards are cut to shape and finished off by mild steel surround.
Rich using a soft mallet to tap the surround into place.
Meanwhile on the New Wild Garden…
The Recycled Shipping Container which acts as a Garden Office was put into position at the weekend. Busy time for Landform moving these bulky structures around! But again – all in a days work!
The Garden Office has a green roof (done by the Green Roof Company) , and it was delivered to Chelsea with this and it’s habitat walls already fitted, as well as a full length glazed panel window! No room for any damages then!
The Recycled Shipping Container arrives in all it's glory...
The Container being lifted into position.
Garden Office (almost) ready for use!
At the weekend the Pavillion metalwork structure was craned into position in the Show Garden. This was no mean feat!
The framework for the Pavillion is made from mild steel, which will be clad with timber in a soft chocolate/coffee colour, to match the warm hues of the Australian sand and vibrancy of the garden.
The Shade Pavillion being craned into place at the weekend.
Getting these structures into place takes a lot of co-ordination from the team, but it’s all in a days work…and take a peak at the New Wild Garden where similar things were were also being put into place on the same day!
Yesterday, arriving in style, the circular mild steel pools arrived at the Landform yard.
The pools were unloaded from the truck using a vacuum lifting plate on our crane and laid out so that Bill Bunce, our specialist metalwork fabricator, could get stuck into some welding here on site.
The pools will be connected by a rill and we hope to assemble these on site at Chelsea early next week.
Bill Bunce on site at Landform
Welding the Pools
Led by award-winning landscape designer Nigel Dunnett & The Landscape Agency, the Royal Bank of Canada New Wild Garden will be RHS Chelsea’s first full-scale “rain garden”, designed to capture and use every single drop of rain that falls on it.
The same team also collaborated on the recently-opened RBC Rain Garden at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) London Wetland Centre as part of the RBC Blue Water Project.
The RBC New Wild Garden brings together two major themes in British gardening in the last 100 years: the Arts and Crafts ideal – celebrating the artistic and painterly use of plants, combined with high quality and traditional craftsmanship, local materials and strong sense of place – and the wild garden – celebrating the beauty of nature, and the naturalistic use of garden plants.
The rain garden element is in keeping with the goals of the RBC Blue Water Project, a wide-ranging, 10-year global commitment to help protect the world’s most precious natural resource: fresh water.
Designed by Nigel Dunnett at The Landscape Agency
Landform Consultants were brought onboard to carry out the build of this project at the Chelsea Flower Show and the build started on Friday 6th May!
The build at Chelsea Flower Show will be led by our foreman Richard.
We have been working with our team and specialists to create the habitat walls, the circular pools and recycled sea container garden building since Autumn 2010.
The garden will have a permanent home at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust’s headquarters at Slimbridge in Gloucs after the Chelsea Flower Show.
