Chelsea Flower Show: Yorkshire garden voted best of decade

The winning garden was inspired by the Yorkshire Dales

A garden inspired by the Yorkshire Dales has won the Garden of the Decade award at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show.

The cottage garden featuring dry stone walls, a bothy and a flower meadow originally took a gold award at the London show in 2018.

It has now been voted by the public as the best garden featured at Chelsea over the past 10 years.

The garden's designer, Yorkshireman Mark Gregory, said winning the accolade "means the world".

"Chelsea is always a team effort and this award is for everyone involved," he said.

"I'm so proud to have been a part of it and I hope this garden and the 2019 Welcome to Yorkshire garden will inspire people to visit the home county of which I'm so proud."

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Ten gardens were shortlisted for the public to vote for their favourite and three of the gardens were sponsored by the tourism body Welcome to Yorkshire.

Previous Yorkshire gardens on the list included another designed by Mark Gregory in 2019 which featured a canal, and one from 2016 by Matthew Wilson which was based on the stained glass East Window at York Minster.

This year's Chelsea Flower Show was a virtual exhibition after the event was cancelled for the first time since World War Two due to the coronavirus lockdown.

Content including tours of gardens by designers like Monty Don and demonstrations were posted online.

Chelsea Flower Show

• The first show opened on 20 May 1913 with the first events held over three days within a single marquee

• A show still took place in 1915 after war was declared in Europe although with fewer exhibitors. It was then cancelled for the remainder of World War One

• Rain during the 1932 show was so severe that a summer house fell to pieces

• The flower show was discontinued again in 1939 due to World War Two, only returning in 1947

• The RHS lifted its ban on gnomes for the centenary show in 2013 and famous faces such as Elton John and Helen Mirren painted figures to sell for charity

• The current Great Pavilion is about 11,775 sq m (2.9 acres) in size, approximately enough room to park 500 London buses