Kate Dufton, RHS Malvern Spring Festival Show Lead at Three Counties Showground, commented: “This year’s theme is ‘Gardening for Change’, celebrating the ongoing evolution in the world of horticulture and embracing the positive impact this is having on the mental wellbeing of people, communities and the planet. Our 2024 Festival seeks to inspire a new wave of green-fingered individuals, equip visitors with a greater knowledge of resilient gardening techniques and generally celebrate gardening and community initiatives across the UK. We’ll have houseplants, an immersive feature garden, inspiring show gardens, many interactive demonstrations and plenty of insights into planting for the future. We’re hoping to do everything we can to spread the message about the benefits to wellbeing that gardening brings and show its vital role in fostering positive change in our lives and the world.”
The growth in green indoor spaces will be celebrated with a new, dedicated Festival of Houseplants, featuring specialist traders and experts to provide inspiration and answer questions. Giant terrariums will be on show, each standing at more than four metres tall, providing botanical snap shots of different plant-scapes from around the world. Jacob James from Grow Tropical will be filling one with rare tropical houseplants, while Hayley Stephens from Mint Plants will be showcasing cacti and succulents. Sarah Gerrard-Jones and Adam Critien will be creating a botanical paradise complete with a water feature. Daily workshops on terrarium planting and care are set to be delivered by Ben Newell of Worcester Terrariums. Jonny Balchandani, will be showing visitors how to propagate from their houseplants and create their own versions of his celebrated indoor jungle.
With sustainable and regenerative gardening increasingly at the forefront of people’s minds, the large collection of nurseries exhibiting in the Floral Marquee should provide inspiration such as Celtic Wildflowers, who will be bringing an array of locally-sourced native plants, shrubs and trees to the show. Two pot-swapping stations, located next to the Floral Marquee’s Plant Crèche and within the Plant Village, will offer shoppers the opportunity to exchange plastic containers for plantable POSIpot transportation sleeves, which can be planted straight into the ground. All the plastic pots collected during the festival will be recycled after the long weekend.
Focussing on the rising costs of living, nurseries such as Proctor’s will exhibiting medium to large-sized herbaceous perennials that can be easily divided and shared, such as achillea, leucanthemum and nepeta. The Kitchen Garden Plant centre will show an array of herbs that root well in water, such as mint and oregano. Seed company Stocks & Green, will exhibit vibrant annuals, grown from seed to fill herbaceous borders.
The Tips & Tricks Theatre throughout the festival hosts demonstrations of gardening techniques by Leigh Johnstone; Chris Collins will be presenting ‘Small Space, Big Ideas’ on Thursday; Jason Williams with ‘Small Space Container Gardening’ on Friday; Ellen Mary is talking about ‘Endless Possibilities: Things You Can Do with Plants’ on Saturday; and Adam Kirtland with ‘Garden DIY Made Easy’ on Sunday.