Hampton Court Flower Show
“Welcome to Glastonbury,” joked one of the security people as we arrived at a very muddy Hampton Court - he wasn’t far wrong! All the walkways were reduced to thick mud although the temporary metal paths did help. It didn’t dampen anyone’s spirits though as it had been two years since the last Hampton Court Flower Show and people were determined to see (and buy!) as much as they could. It was Tuesday. Members’ day. I was there to help Golden Hill Nursery sell hydrangeas and it proved to be an extremely busy day in an extremely busy week.
First things first: we check all the plants and brush off as much of the lime blossom that we can as the stall is under a large lime tree. This tree proved useful to people later on in the day as they took shelter from the showers. I always enjoy being there on members’ day as many of the women are decked out in flowery dresses, flowery shoes, flowery bags and …flowery rain macs! If it’s got a flower on it, they wear it. The trollies are fascinating as well; they’re like miniature gardens being wheeled along and I enjoy seeing what people have bought.
It’s also interesting to see which hydrangeas are popular each year. This year, we sold a lot of macrophylla 'Doppio Rosa’ (I ended up buying one too!) as well as macrophylla Doppio Bianco/Wedding Gown (I bought one of those as well…) and the Flame Blue sold out. It is a very pretty hydrangea but of course, being blue, it needs acidic soil unless you use hydrangea colourant. We all spend a lot of time at the show explaining to people how the ph of soil determines the colour of the flowers.
I did have a little bit of time to pop into the Floral Marquee and succumbed to buying ‘Caitlin’ - one of Dibley’s streptocarpus plants- as well as a couple of succulents. Bang on trend! David Austen Roses were not there this year so Peter Beales Roses must have been smiling.
The highlight of the day for me was meeting both Keith Weed (RHS President and very friendly) and Carol Klein. Carol was pretending to buy plants for the Thursday edition of BBC’s ‘Hampton Court’ and I was filmed ‘selling’ her a Vanilla Fraise paniculata. She was also very friendly, chatting to people and offering advice about what plants to put together. My only regret? I tuned into BBC 2 on Thursday only to discover that my moment of glory had been consigned to the cutting room floor. My 15 minutes of fame will have to wait for another day…