Shows

2006: Last Year's Show Season

The 2006 flower show season was certainly a glorious summer for Jekka and the team, scooping gold medals at every show we attended.

Let’s take a look back at those award-winning displays…

Malvern - May

For the first time in Malvern’s history, Jekka displayed a circular stand, featuring an exquisite selection of culinary herbs. Our aim was to evoke a pretty little herb garden, showing visitors how much you can achieve in a very small space.

Jekka’s gold medal winning Malvern display

One of the key plants in the Malvern display was the Australian Oval Leafed Mint Bush (Prostanthera ovalifolia AGM), a small aromatic tree with spectacular bell-shaped purple flowers in the spring.

Chelsea - May

Jekka scooped her 11th gold medal at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show for her fascinating display celebrating herbs of our past, present and future. This breaks the previous record for a female garden designer set by Beth Chatto who won 10 Chelsea golds.

A classic eye motif formed the structure of the herb garden display; a simple oval design with a circular brick, Chamomile and Thyme centre. A stunning selection of herbs in containers lay clustered within this secret central patio area, bordered by two traditional herb gardens.


The pretty pathway leading to the secret patio

Jekka’s new Guernsey Mint (Mentha suaveolens ‘Le Boues’) appeared at Chelsea for the first time. Cultivated for its medicinal properties since ancient times, mint is aromatic, calmative, antiseptic, antispasmodic, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, antiparisitic, a stimulant - and of course perfect for mint sauces and jellies.

A unique feature of Jekka’s display was the Cancer Bush (Sutherlandia frutescens) or Kankerbos as it is known in Afrikaans, in which Prince Charles was particularly interested. It has stunning red flowers with intriguing seed capsules. Medicinally it is used to treat stomach problems and internal cancers.

Other herbs with a starring role included Woad, (Isatis tinctoria), the ancient blue dye plant which is also used in Chinese medicine, Green Lavender (Lavandula viridis) with its gorgeous pine and lemon scent, aromatic Painted Sage (Salvia viridis var. comata) dominated by stunning purple, pink, blue and white bracts, and French Tarragon (Artemisia dracunculus), an excellent culinary herb as as well as a remedy for toothache.

BBC Gardeners’ World Live – June

Resulting in her third gold of the 2006 show season, Jekka’s display for BBC Gardeners’ World Live at the NEC delighted both the judges and the public alike.

Featuring a stunning abundance of red poppies and gorgeous blue cornflowers, Jekka created a pretty floral herb display, epitomising perfectly the traditional summer herb garden.

Jekka's display for Gardeners' World Live

Hampton Court Palace Flower Show - July

Jekka’s display for the Hampton Court Palace Flower Show offered a magical celebration of colour, both of flowers and foliage.

At one end of this beautiful elliptical display, Jekka created a charming terracotta patio overlooked by vibrant poppies and red nasturtiums. From the patio, a winding path bordered with striking golden box led us to two magnificent olive trees, providing the impressive height and structure for the display. The pale mauve of the fringed lavender (Lavandula dentata) contrasted brilliantly with the gold of the box hedges.

A celebration of colour at Hampton Court

Tatton Park Flower Show - July

Our final flower show of the 2006 season resulted in our fifth gold medal. The pretty circular display featured an attractive archway festooned in Goat’s Rue or French Lilac (Galega officinalis) with gorgeous mauve flowers.

A pathway bordered on each side by Painted Sage (Salvia viridis var. comata) led to a patio area, featuring Angelica Vicar’s Mead (Angelica sylvestris ‘Vicar’s Mead’) which came into flower during the show and was a real hit with the visitors. Also in flower and in berry was the American Pokeroot (Phytolacca americana), providing a real sense of dramatic scale structure for the exhibit.

The pathway leading to a patio in our Tatton Park display

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