Brewin Dolphin with offices in Trafalgar Place, Brighton appointed Cleve West to be the designer for its first show garden at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show, and he has been awarded Best in Show for the second consecutive year and yet another gold medal for his Brewin Dolphin garden, this morning.
Jamie Matheson, Executive Chairman at Brewin Dolphin says, ‘We’re absolutely delighted with Cleve’s success today – we’re so pleased that all his great work has received the recognition it deserves. The Brewin Dolphin Garden is everything we’d hoped it to be and more, plus it survived both flood and drought thanks to the hard work of the team .’
This year’s design is a real departure from Cleve’s usual style – partly due to the unusual use of topiary, symbolic of the sponsor’s history, stability and creativity and it certainly made an impression on the judges yesterday.
Cleve said, “I’m delighted to be part of this project to help celebrate Brewin Dolphin’s amazing anniversary. 250 years ago, some of the big names in landscaping were ripping out topiary to make way for a more rural idyll. Fortunately it made a comeback in the 19th Century and this garden will show that everyone can try their hand at in gardens of all sizes.”
The garden design can be described ‘formal and timeless, contemporary yet traditional’ – which are appropriate descriptions of Brewin Dolphin, which has an office in Brighton, an investment management company that has stood the test of time.
‘The topiary figures have roughly the same form but each is subtly different, which throws the symmetry,’ says Cleve. ‘Topiary never really features strongly at Chelsea and yet it plays such a big part in our gardening heritage. It’s something that anybody can have a go at in a garden of any size.’
Around each yew sentinel sits a loose tapestry of planting in delicate whites, yellows and lime greens, dotted with jewel-like reds. ‘The plants are threaded together in seemingly random ways to keep the garden looking alive and not too static’, says Cleve.
