“Gold! Always believe in your soul”
Spandau Ballet
We thought we might get it. We felt like we deserved it. But, then again so does everyone who slaves away for 3 weeks through thick and thin. So with more relief than euphoria, we received our 4th RHS Gold medal. A huge honour, and great reward to all those who have been involved with the garden in some shape or form. There are too many to name here, but I hope you can take a slice of the medal for yourselves. Notable, unsung heroes include Helen and Catherine from plantify.co.uk who sat and deadheaded several hundred Gaura and Calamagrostis through heatwave and hailstorm.
The garden images have since gone global through the Reuters news agency so people in Vancouver, Sydney, Chicago and Beijing have been waking up to images of our garden, and more importantly the World Vision message it drives.
More humbling than the medal has been the public and professional reaction to the space. Overall, it has been universally positive and people have enjoyed the opportunity to stand and gaze for a few moments. A few fave comments included:
“If you want to sit down in a garden, be surrounded by flowers and think that life might be worth living than this is the garden for me”
“When I saw this on the TV, I just knew I had to come to the show”
“I have sponsored a child for several years now with World Vision, and to see this is an affirmation of the work and support they offer children all over the world”
“It makes me want to go home, and sponsor a child…make a difference”
“Just unique and beautiful”
We were even bowed to by a lovely man exhibiting from Bulgaria. Thank you, so much for all the kind words and support throughout the last month…it means a lot more than the Gold medal would alone.
It confirms our belief that gardens can be more than just vehicles for aesthetic beauty, and they offer an important medium to make the world a slightly better place…
Hope to see you all again in 2012!
Never stop dreaming…
John @ FlemonsWarlandDesign
Congratulations! And a great way to start a blog post…
I have been a child sponser for many years and have always been pleased with the work World Vision do. I have just received the latest copy of Insight in which I read about the success of the World Vision garden at Hampton Court. Please could you tell me how this was funded as I have not seen any reference to a sponser. These gardens cost a huge amount of money to put together and I would be very unhappy if I were to discover that it was paid for out of funds.
I await your reply,
Many thanks for all your good works.
Great to hear from another child sponsor. The garden was part funded by both Worldvision and plantify.co.uk. All plants were sponsored by plantify.co.uk. The designers – FWD – took a particularly low fee and were largely remunerated by the sales of these after the show ended. This meant that the cost to Worldvision was kept to a minimum, ensuring that Worldvision can focus on securing additional child sponsorships. plantify.co.uk has continued the support for Worldvision by sponsoring the prize for their recent harvest competition (paying for both the prize and an additional £500).