It’s a cold but wonderfully sunny morning in early March when I visit Frogheath Landscapes, the West Sussex nursery where garden designer Charlie Chase is constructing his first ever garden for Chelsea Flower Show, which is sponsored by Project giving back and with support from the Bupa Foundation. For Charlie, this is the final push on the ‘All About Plants’ garden which has been over a year and a half in the making, and the anticipation is palpable.
The garden is a collaboration between Charlie’s studio, Chase Gardens, and YoungMinds, a charity whose mission is to build a nurturing community that can provide support for young people struggling with their mental health. Both literally and conceptually, Charlie’s garden is a physical manifestation of this message; every corner has been designed to represent resilience and hope. ‘You can’t help what happens to you, but you can grow around it,’ says Charlie.
It's a lesson he learned first-hand. ‘I discovered horticulture after I lost my mum in 2015 and was trying to chart a course through the mist of grief. Gardening gave me a community,’ says Charlie, who cites his former mentors Patrick Featherstone and Dan Bristow as two of the major influences on his career: ‘they are like my adoptive botanical parents,’ he says. Charlie cut his teeth in each of Dan and Patrick's studios before studying at Capel Manor College in 2017. He opened his own studio a year later and has been paying it forward ever since.
So much of Charlie's Chelsea garden does just that: it is about building a community to help heal others. To bring the project to life, Charlie has launched his inaugural training programme for budding horticulturalists, which, as he explains, has always been part of the plan: ‘I always had something in me saying “you should be training the next generation”’. Six young gardeners – introduced to Charlie via YoungMinds – have been working with Charlie on the garden. ‘They came to the pre-build site, did design workshops with me and will help with the planting when we move the garden to Chelsea. There’s a whole educational side to the process which felt so valid,’ he says.
Anchoring the garden is a tall Gleditsia tree. It was the first plant that Charlie learned to identify and its presence in the garden is a nod to his – forgive the pun – roots. Taking centre stage in the 40 square meter space it is framed by two conifers emerging from broken boulders representing the immense pressure on young people today: ‘There’s eco anxiety, social anxiety and the rising cost of living, and young people are feeling these pressures so much,’ says Charlie, ‘the tree symbolises their strength and resilience.’
This scene acts as the garden’s natural divider: in front of it are what Charlie refers to as ‘haze of yellow and white’ plants that signify light and hope. The species in question: Zizea Aurea, Pimpinella major and baptisia Lemon meringue come to life in a sea of sunshine and cloud shades. At the back of the garden, thriving in the shade cast by the central tree, a woodland in miniature filled with native species. ‘I want young people to learn about natives and why they are important to biodiversity,’ says Charlie of the species that will be nestled into the pointing of the cracks in the pathway. ‘There will be ferns, mosses, helleborus foetidus and galliums: the idea is to fill the space with plants that people can recognise. As you walk along the pathway and find a way through the garden, there’s this sense of belonging and familiarity,’ he explains. Much like the cracked boulder, the stepping stones that lead you through the garden have been sourced from Gallagher quarry in Maidstone; it is the closest one to London and helps to keep the garden’s carbon footprint at a minimum.
For Charlie, biodiversity has been a key consideration. Alongside the myriad plant varieties, he has worked closely with the team at Frogheath Landscapes to build a low garden wall made of rammed earth (a mixture of clay, Kelpcrete, and crushed sandstone) that, once dried in large blocks, can be drilled into to form the perfect habitat for nesting bees. The same can be said of the habitat wall at the back of the garden: ‘It’s a wall dedicated to biodiversity: these insects don’t often get the habitat they need in the garden, but they are vital,’ says Charlie.
The treatment of these insects is not dissimilar to that of the plant varieties and indeed the young people who have helped Charlie to plant them. It is about providing them with the environment to thrive. And we have no doubt that come May 19, when the flowers are in bloom and the team’s hard work has finally paid off, thriving they all will be.
More Chelsea Flower Show stories:
- All the Chelsea Flower Show gardens to get excited about for 2026
- Chelsea Flower Show 2026: tickets, locations and everything to expect this year
- Silver gilt? The RHS Chelsea Flower Show’s medals, explained
- Chelsea in Bloom 2026: the free flower festival returns with zodiac-inspired florals and David Attenborough installations
