Cast your eye down the roll call of gardens for RHS Chelsea 2025 and you’ll see the The Wildlife Trusts’ British Rainforest Garden evoking the wild woods that once wrapped Britain’s west coast; the show sponsor, The Newt, showcasing the semi-desert of the Karoo in South Africa; and Seawilding, designed by newcomer Ryan McMahon, contemplating the natural beauty of Loch Craignish in Scotland.
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These celebrations of nature and evocations of a particular landscape resurrect that old chestnut of a question: is it a garden or is it a landscape? The answer is complex and multi-layered. Many now believe that this increased leaning towards naturalistic gardens at the world’s premier horticultural event is not a fleeting trend, but a here-to- stay movement that continues to address the big-picture environmental themes of today.
There is a feeling among many designers that ‘design’ itself has become almost embarrassing, and that the role of the designer is to create something that looks wholly natural Tim Richardson, garden critic and historian
The most prestigious garden show on the planet is firmly on the pulse of this thinking and well placed to showcase, educate and, most importantly, inspire us in the conservation, regeneration and rewilding
of our declining green zones and wildlife populations, as well as exploring new ecological practices that enable us to garden in changing climates.
“Gardens at RHS Chelsea in more recent years have embraced a more naturalistic look, driven by a growing emphasis on biodiversity and wildlife,” acknowledges garden designer Arne Maynard, “and it’s inevitable that the boundaries between ‘garden’ and ‘landscape’ have become more blurred.
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“However, RHS Chelsea gardens are not really intended to be direct blueprints for domestic gardens. Instead, they are immersive, highly conceptual showcases that are packed with ideas and plants, offering pockets of inspiration for people to take home, rather than recreate in their entirety.”
Garden critic and landscape historian Tim Richardson agrees. “Scenes drawn from nature have become integral to Chelsea show gardens,” he says. “This reflects the general move in horticulture towards ecology and specifically the trend for replicating plant communities found in the wild, but in garden form.
In the Chelsea context, this is presented as a kind of quotation or slice of nature. There is a feeling among many designers that ‘design’ itself has become almost embarrassing, and that the role of the designer is to create something that looks wholly natural.”
Copy or interpretation?
An early pioneer of show gardens ‘inspired by’ and ‘evoking’ the landscape is designer James Basson, who, in 2013, created After the Fire, a conceptual interpretation of how plant life ‘pushed back’ through the burned andscape following forest fires in the South of France. Was it a garden or a landscape? ‘‘You can’t carbon copy landscapes,” he says. “It’s like trying to copy a painting. You make your own interpretation of it. It is this human element that makes it a garden.”
Tom Stuart-Smith’s 2024 plant-perfect take on a hazel coppice with its magical, mostly white, planting is a fine example of this thinking. In reality, says Tim Richardson, these designs are far more intensely realised than what is found in the wild, and they need all-important management – better known as gardening. “Without the gardener, they are no longer a garden,” confirms James Basson.
Chelsea is about trying things you can’t necessarily try in other people’s gardens… It’s about taking a creative risk and stretching yourself, designer Charlotte Harris
Rooted in place
A strong sense of local identity is a perspective that echoes loudly through the masterplans for 2025. “I think there is a move towards gardens that are much more expressive of the places they are in,” says Nigel Dunnett, who is creating an abstract representation of a Scottish dunescape for this year’s show.
“It’s a garden with a strong sense of place and attachment, but is a creative and imaginative interpretation of that starting point. To me, this is what makes the difference between a ‘naturescape’ and a garden – that element of artful process, and the deliberate intention to go beyond the original inspiration, rather than trying to faithfully recreate it to the smallest detail.”
Since 2023, as part of its Green Legacy promise, the RHS has required show gardens to have a plan to relocate, reuse or repurpose. Surely this has an impact on its design? “Chelsea is just a stop along the road to somewhere else; to a place where that garden will be used and appreciated by a community or a hospital or charity forever,” confirms RHS judge, James Alexander-Sinclair.
Wildlife impact
Depicting the plight of declining insect and animal populations through habitat-focused gardens has resulted in both intense criticism and high praise in past years.
“I think it’s a natural expression of our time and everyone’s concern for the environment,” says Adam Hunt of Urquhart & Hunt – the design practice that caused heated debate in 2022 for A Rewilding Britain Landscape, which won Best in Show for its meticulous recreation of a beaver-made ecosystem. “We suggested that non-human species could create a garden and maybe that was challenging for some people.”
Sponsor power
Chelsea is famed for capturing the imagination of thousands of in-person visitors and the eyeballs of millions who watch the TV coverage. “That is why having a garden at the show has become such a powerful platform for charities and organisations who want to engage with the public about their work,” confirms Arne Maynard, who is a trustee of Project Giving Back, the grant-giving charity that funds gardens for good causes at Chelsea.
It’s clear that sponsors are steering the naturescape narrative – and not just around ecology. In 2019, The RHS Back to Nature Garden, designed by HRH The Princess of Wales (then Duchess of Cambridge) with Andrée Davies and Adam White, brought to life the emotional and physical benefits of a woodland garden. ‘Nature-based’ activities are now one of the four pillars of social prescribing in the NHS. “The overwhelming trend right now is for this light touch. People are gardening with, rather than against, nature,” says James Alexander-Sinclair.
I think it’s a natural expression of our time and everyone’s concern for the environment, Adam Hunt of Urquhart & Hunt
“Chelsea is about trying things you can’t necessarily try in other people’s gardens… It’s about taking a creative risk and stretching yourself,” says designer Charlotte Harris, a sentiment that is echoed by Adam Hunt: “Project Giving Back changed the dynamic. It gave us the opportunity to do a garden that we wanted to do.”
Pushing boundaries
‘Artistic expression’ is a phrase that comes up frequently. Nigel Dunnett sums it up: “We must view the making of gardens as a pure art-form in itself, and not just as a horticultural process to grow plants, or as a functional process to decide where the seating goes, or as an ecological process to faithfully recreate a particular habitat. It can be all of those things, but it has to be more than that.”
Critics argue that the result of all this is a little one-note for Chelsea visitors, who expect old-school horticultural glamour. James Alexander-Sinclair thinks not. “There’s room for everything at Chelsea.
One of the skillful things that the RHS does is to balance the garden styles. Rather than all being conventional or all unconventional, there’s a gallimaufry of styles.” Helena Pettit, RHS director of shows, commercial and innovation, agrees: “We want the RHS Chelsea Flower Show to inspire, excite and delight gardeners across the world, no matter what style of gardening they wish to pursue.”
Last word goes to Adam Hunt – he of the beaver dam. “Is it a garden or a landscape?” he muses. “For us, it’s a bit of a non-question. Every garden is situated within a landscape, and you can’t consider it as an isolated entity. Certainly not if you want biodiversity in your garden.” I don’t think many people can argue with that.
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