Britain’s threatened rainforests will make an appearance at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show, with a garden dedicated to the lost, wet woods of the west.
The Wildlife Trusts is creating a garden with designer Zoe Claymore to showcase the threatened Atlantic temperate rainforest habitat which once swathed western coasts of Britain, the island of Ireland and the Isle of Man.
Wildlife-rich wet woodlands have shrunk from around a fifth of land to just 1%, and the “rainforest garden” at Chelsea will highlight efforts by the Trusts in partnership with insurance company Aviva to restore and protect the habitat.
The Trusts said the garden, sponsored by grant giving charity Project Giving Back, aims to inspire people to support the restoration efforts and show how nature-friendly gardening can help British wildlife.
Ms Claymore said collaborating with the trusts to design the garden had “genuinely poignant meaning” for her, as it linked to her childhood memories of playing and exploring British rainforest in Devon as a child.
“Some of my happiest childhood memories are playing in and around Lydford Gorge, which is a British rainforest on Dartmoor, because my grandparents had a house with a woodland garden, and we just went into the woodland from the garden, and it was really magical,” she said.
Ms Claymore said she drew inspiration from a very wet visit to the woods in Devon Wildlife Trust’s Dart Valley reserve, drawing on what she saw there for the planting and creating a water feature that follows the path of the Dart river.
I want to use this opportunity I've been given to really focus on the more unsung heroes of the plant kingdom, the mosses and ferns, the things we overlook when we've got an awful lot of flowers
The British rainforest garden will feature a raised wooden walkway snaking over moss-covered ground past a tumbling waterfall, lichen covered birch trees, a rare royal fern and bluebells, marsh marigolds and foxgloves, backed by a fern and moss wall spanning the eight-metre width of the garden.
It uses low-carbon reclaimed wood and stone sourced from the west country, and the raised walkway maximises the area of planting, she added.
It is not the first time wild habitats have come to the Chelsea Flower Show, with a “rewilding” garden inspired by the impact beavers can have when reintroduced to the landscape scooping the best show garden award in 2022 – though it divided opinion over whether it counted as a garden.
Ms Claymore said she expected some people to be upset about her design, but added it could help people to question what a garden is, with growing numbers wanting a “more wild and more free aesthetic in their spaces”.
And she said: “I want to use this opportunity I’ve been given to really focus on the more unsung heroes of the plant kingdom, the mosses and ferns, the things we overlook when we’ve got an awful lot of flowers.”
She said the design aimed to reflect the work the Wildlife Trusts and Aviva were doing to protect British rainforests, as well as translating it to a more domestic setting to allow people to identify and pick up elements they could use in their own gardens.
“It’s a fantastic opportunity to boost the cause of temperate woodland and I hope that’s what it does,” she added.
Craig Bennett, chief executive of The Wildlife Trusts, said the network of charities was “thrilled” to be bringing the wonder of British rainforests to the Chelsea Flower Show.
“People are always amazed when they see the astonishing range of magical mosses and fantastic ferns that call our rainforests home, as well as the other wildlife that depends on them, like the pied flycatcher.
“They are truly awe-inspiring places,” he said.
The garden will form part of the “all about plants” section of the Royal Horticultural Society’s flagship show, which takes place in late May.
