For one week, many of the shops in Chelsea and Belgravia are showing off some impressive floral work with free displays that align with the Chelsea Flower Show.
Of the two, Chelsea in Bloom is the larger, with a lot more displays to check out, and a very impressive exhibit in the centre of Sloane Square.
Chelsea in Bloom’s 2023 theme is Flowers on Film, taking inspiration from the characters and storylines that have graced the big screen, which is why there’s a massive Jurassic Park inspired display with a large foliate dinosaur in the centre.
The covered walkway leading from the main shopping street into Duke of York Square has been turned into a tunnel of flowers, while many of the shops on the main road now overflow onto the pavements with their displays. Most seem to take the bloom part of the message to heart, although I spied a few that were much more ornamental in design. Quite nice, but not quite blooming nice.
A bit further away, and smaller in scale is Belgravia in Bloom, which has a theme about wild animals – so the streets are a floral bloom of wildlife.
Waitrose on Motcomb Street has covered its front with a pair of peacocks – which aren’t quite what you expect from the Waitrose essential range.
Quite good fun are two related displays at Cadogan Place – one of King Kong climbing up the Carlton Tower hotel, and on the corner of the garden square is another King Kong although this time more locally topical, as it’s climbing up Big Ben.
A tip with the Belgravia in Bloom is to ignore the map that says there are displays on Eccleston Street, as I didn’t see anything obviously new there, so stick to Pimlico Road, Elizabeth Street and Motcomb Street.
On Pimlico Road, the antiques dealer has created a marvellous ruined landscape, but the furniture shop let the side down by using artificial grass. Nul points!
One of the amusing difficulties considering the nature of this part of London is working out if a floral display has been added for this week only or is a permanent part of their shop window. I quickly worked out that looking on the paving to see if it’s stained from the potplants tends to be a clue.
A tip, chatting to some fellow trail followers, the Chelsea display was very busy by mid-morning, so many get up early and do that first. The Belgravia displays seemed much quieter, probably because they’re not right next to the Chelsea Flower Show.
Both run until this Sunday (28th May) and offer a pleasing hour or so wandering about posh-lands looking at some very interesting floral displays, and completely free of charge.
Visited this morning fabulous displays going again Thursday huge thanks to everyone who made it all possible
Thank you for all the tips of where to see the flower displays. I loved the Tiffany’s one. That was number one for me, the pandas number in 2nd place with the tiger and bear also fantastic. Incredible work. Good luck to everyone. All the displays were fabulous.
Love this!
Beautiful!