Intense Florals … and Trauma «

Intense Florals … and Trauma

Tuesday 24th May 2022

Chelsea Flower Show Press Day!

Frockage: outsize shirt-waister, to the floor even; floral print more floral than ever seen before. What can have happened?

Menswear: suddenly the Norfolk jacket, pleated at the back. Still jackettes, crackpot suits in pink…

The Gardens: Care, Mental Health, Sustainability, Racial Equality, Sewing in Prisons… Oh for the old days when it was a rockery or a rose garden.

But the guests: and who would have thought trauma, arising, quite frankly, from Design. A garden was very nearly a killer.

Royston King hailed me from the RHS enclosure and ushered me in. I should say I was there on my own account on behalf of Dainty Lady TV. With my nerves I was scarcely not going to notice, once in to the champagne area, a narrow stretch of water with no barrier between paving slabs, and Greatnesses packed around with champagne. The biggest worry was Gloria Hunniford, assaulting the invitation-only PV demesne from the rear, penetrating through a flap at the back. She’s over 80. But if she’d come in the right way, from the front, at least she might have seen the watery crevice and been warned. The Perrys were in evidence, he with the turquoise nail varnish which is now compulsory for men apparently. Otherwise dressed as a child’s idea of a garden. Mrs Perry said she’d been to Buckingham Palace and it was like a 1950s Golf Club. I said, ‘The wallpapers are mostly Queen Mary from the 1930s.’ ‘Well, yes,’ Mrs P goes, ‘but then a 1950s Gold Club would have been left over from the 30s, anyway, wouldn’t it?’ Clever. She said the only photo she had of Grayson to submit for the admission process, with the required white background, showed him with a swollen eye. It was a selfie he’d sent his wife for diagnosis. His eye is now recovered, thank goodness, but she wondered, if, at the entrance gate, she’d have to duff him over in order to convince the authorities as to his identity. Only allowed in with swollen eye. Where was it?

Suddenly: ‘Hello, I’m Fiona Bruce.’ I wouldn’t have known. Blonde and outdoor-looking. ‘Hello, I’m Fiona Bruce.’ So she continued. Thin, long frock and denim jacket. By now the Treasures were piling up – Anneka, Nick Knowles, Ainsley Harriot, Angela Rippon. So devastating. All these gifts showering down at once. And the surge and brilliance of fame: ‘How wonderful,’ ‘Absolutely marvellous,’ ‘I can’t believe it’. Just giving and giving, the quality, the comments, the poise..

Then, horror: lady in the watery ravine. And sinking. Hauled out by Lady Salisbury’s head gardener. Royston’s friend, Noisette, at once in attendance. She’s a Goddess. Not Gloria Hunniford. She was spared. But Lady not moving. Even at that level, nobody sure what to do – carry on, soldier on with champagne reception or would that look bad? Agony of waiting for paras. Blank of nothing. Royston thankful his guests so much to the rescue. ‘It’s important that she’s comforted by another black woman.’ At last, trolleys, bags. Where there had been no doctors, suddenly there were two. You could tell: they are labelled on their backs ‘doctor’. Lady taken away. Living. Later heard of as being at home, in one piece.

Traumatised, we retreat to a bench with the Perrys. Royston left to fetch his National Treasure, only just in time for the President’s lunch. The NT had got the day wrong. Was still in bed at 10 am. At least fresh for the event, I thought. Royston fuming though. ‘What is the point of fame if you can’t get the day right?’ Noisette bonds instantly with Mum Perry. ‘I’m not doing another bloody degree,’ I hear MP saying. Grayson wants me to take shot of him and Noisette, in horror movie style as if they’d just been set upon by aliens. I’m a bit of a spare part while Mum Perry and Noisette bond. Finally MP declares that they haven’t found a common enemy yet but she’s sure they will. Noisette and I depart for the gardens and a snack. Much waylaid at the Swiss garden with full account of Switzerland and its flora. The harvest is otherwise thinner but still adequate: Rachel da Thame, Carol Klein, Dame Ester dressed as a daffodil, Dame Judi, who blessed my sneezing, Craig Revel Horwood in lemon.

End up by luck at foot of stairs where they’re coming out from the President’s Lunch. Royston and his Treasure… Then begins a phase of wonder as never known before. We begin to tour the ground. First of all, Stoker and Amanda, but no real sign of what is to come. With the Duchess, we discuss the Airbnb in Bakewell where Royston and I are to stay next month for the Garden Museum Literary Festival at Chatsworth. Next Philip Scholfield – ‘She’s a National Treasure,’ Royston bellows. ‘What are you?’ ‘I haven’t been dug up yet,’ Philip Scholfield goes. But PS is delirious for Royston’s Treasure. We can hardly advance. ‘How marvellous!’ ‘How wonderful!’ the Treasure goes, before retreating to the Ladies because her skirt is falling down. Out again, a crescendo must be reached: Sophie Raworth, Valerie Singleton and Michael Heseltine all at once. All the connections, going back years, light up at once, the pure sunny uplands of fame. But no, there’s more. How can this height be maintained? By one of the show gardens, the DIY man from TV – as good as on the floor before Royston’s Treasure. Leads her away to sit in the show garden on a bench where they can be seen in deep, intimate confab. When the Treasure returns I say I can’t quite remember the DIY man’s actual name. Neither can she, it turns out. But no matter. The glory, the moment, poised in perfection, progressing through the event…