Supporting RHS Show Gardens 2021 Part 2

September 02, 2021

Read the second part of how London Stone are supporting RHS Flower Shows 2021.

When it comes to providing materials to flower shows, London Stone's Bespoke capabilities help designers achieve exactly the look they want. Designers often give us really tough challenges - and come out smiling!

Will Williams The Viking Friluftsliv Garden for Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2021

This year's bespoke pieces

With the impact of Covid-19 across the world it has meant that, where we would normally provide plenty of bespoke pieces, this year has been a little different. There are a few suspected reasons for this. With the potential for event postponement and last-minute changes, designers are being less adventurous with big bespoke pieces. There has also been difficulty in obtaining raw materials across the industry, which may also be a reason behind fewer bespoke orders. However, the bespoke elements that have come in RHS Flower Shows 2021 are in the form of large, impressive features. This has required us to get up close and personal with scants - like falling off a log for us!

Will Williams' The Viking Friluftsliv Garden

In Will Williams' The Viking Friluftsliv Garden for Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2021, we provided the large Jura Grey slabs. Two solid pieces were used to create an impressive bridge over the plunge pool. Each of the pieces weighed a whopping 1.5 tonnes and the total span of the bridge was 3.3m – not your usual paving size! Read more about this garden here.

Naomi Ferret-Cohen's Finding Our Way: An NHS Tribute Garden

Check out our report on Chelsea Flower Show 2021 for Naomi Ferret-Cohen's garden, Finding Our Way: An NHS Tribute Garden. It featured plenty of bespoke elements using Heathermoor Buff Yorkstone. This immersive garden had plenty of twists and turns in the hard landscaping, facilitated by bespoke-cut curves.

Tom Simpson chose bespoke Jura Green coping and steps for his Cancer Research Pledge Pathway to Success Garden at Hampton Court 2019.. Photographer Joanna Kossak.

Bespoke pieces at previous shows

Some of our bespoke pieces from previous years have been a true challenge for our in-house stone masons to overcome.

Tom Simpson's The Cancer Research Pledge Pathway to Success

One example of this comes from Tom Simpson's stunning The Cancer Research Pledge Pathway To Success. This featured bespoke-cut Jura Green Limestone at RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2019. With a pencil-round prolife cut to millimetre accuracy, the steps were not as simple as they look. The steps' depth changes from 300mm to 400mm as you move across their length. Everything had to be precisely drawn and engineered to produce the sleek final design. Read more about Tom Simpson's garden.

Ann-Marie Powell's Greening Grey Britain Garden for RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2016.

Ann-Marie Powell's Greening Grey Britain

Another impressive illustration of bespoke work was at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2016. Ann-Marie Powell's Greening Grey Britain Garden used our Golden Stone Porcelain and gave it a unique twist. Using our CNC machine the words for “happiness” in various languages were inscribed into the face of the stone. These posed a challenge, even for our expert CNC machine operator Piotr, because porcelain is a very dense stone to cut. However, the result speaks for themselves. The contrast in texture between the smooth porcelain and the inscription demonstrates, in a small detail, just how much bespoke work can impact the overall effect of the garden. Find out more in RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2016. If you'd like to discuss Bespoke options for your garden design, then don't hesitate to contact us. Post updated: June 2025