The winner was An Englishman’s Retreat – designed by Chris Beardshaw the multi gold medal winning Chelsea Flower Show designer from England. Chris added to his pile of gold medals by being awarded a gold medal for his garden at this years Ellerslie flower show. His show-stopping English garden on the shores of Victoria Lake was a crowd favourite. With almost 10,000 plants it grabbed your attention from the moment you saw it. Jordan Frizzel from Outerspace Landscapes, Christchurch managed the construction of the garden.
Left to right. Tony Murrell, Kerrynn Reynish - Trents Nursery, Hillary Timmons, Don Forgie Tui Products sponsor, Jordan Frizzell - Outer Space Landscapes, Robert Hillier - convenor of judges.
Trent’s Nursery from Prebbleton needs to be acknowledged for their phenomenal effort in producing the majority of the plant material. Chris openly admitted to anyone who asked that the plant material supplied from Kerrynn Reynish and her team at Trent’s was world class. He said at the judges de-brief that ‘Plants complete a garden, you can have a brilliant design but unless the plant material stacks up you wont be in the running for a high medal. The plants from Trent’s arrived 10 days prior to the show opening and I had 2 full time staff watering the plants prior to planting to keep them at there optimum.’
What’s even more interesting is that in Chris’s garden they actually planted the plants. Now this may not seem that interesting but normally in show gardens designers leave the plants in their pots so it’s easier to dismantle the exhibit after the show and hide the pots with bark and mulch. He says ‘I like my plants to feel at home in the garden, they thrive once their roots feel the soil, all the plants from my garden will be for sale after the show, the majority will have to be dug out as the roots will have begun the establish themselves in the soil’ I can vouch for that as I was one of the many people who took the opportunity to purchase a slice of Ellerslie and quickly loaded numerous plants from Chris Beadshaws garden.
Tui Products sponsored the award; a very proud Don Forgie from Tui presented the award to Jordan Frizzell from Outerspace Landscapes and Kerrynn Reynish from Trents. Sadly Chris Beardshaw wasn’t available to receive his huge accolade. Don said ‘We are proud to be involved in what we at Tui believe to be the most prestigious award of the show, the people have spoken. This garden has many elements which the public can take home and use, gardeners of all ages and levels can relate and take inspiration from this garden. A tremendous effort by all involved, we are proud to be associated with such a popular and award winning exhibit’
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