The RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2005 - 35 years at the top

Gold Medal

Best Show Garden

BBC RHS People's Award

The Ecover Chelsea Pensioners' Garden was Julian Dowle's 26th garden - and 26th award winner - at the Chelsea Flower Show.

Julian's inspiration for his entry came from discussions with a group of Chelsea Pensioners over a pint. The result was "A Soldier's Dream of Blighty", - a nostalgic vision of an English country pub garden in 1945. The pub, the "Chelsea Pensioner", has a thatched roof with traditional rendered walls covered with climbing roses. Outside is a stone terrace, with benches and tables, surrounded by a cottage garden.

A timber-framed shelter provides a seating area beside the "Dig for Victory" vegetable patch. The vegetables were grown by the Royal Hospital Chelsea using varieties selected from a 1939 catalogue.

A stone gravel path links the pub to a village green and duck pond. The village green - as befits five years of wartime neglect - was awash with wildflowers, symbolically dominated by wild poppies. Both fence and pub were adorned with Union Jack bunting, representing celebrations of the homecoming.

The garden was sponsored by Ecover, whose range of ecologically sound cleaning products provides the ideal solution to anyone concerned about the high levels of unnecessary toxins present in products based on petrochemicals. For the second year running additional support came from Buildbase, UK's fastest growing builders merchants.

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The Ecover Chelsea Pensioners' Garden