Fresh and glamorous at Chelsea

A garden inspired by Dorset’s Jurassic coast

Inspired by the natural contours and materials found along Dorset’s Jurassic coast, RHS Glamourlands: A Techno Folly by Tony Heywood and Alison Condie looks set to be a visual spectacle and the source of much debate.

The garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, supported by M&G Investments, is a hybrid between horticulture, animation and landscape portraiture, and marks the introduction of a new show garden category entitled Fresh Gardens.

Animation, computer games and abstract-shaped structures covered in sparkling jewels – a signature of Tony’s work – stand alongside gnarled, wind-blown pines, similar to those found on many coastlines. Other plants, which are partially laminated, give the impression of being both alive and preserved at the same time.

Framed within an industrial steel chamber, which is mirrored to reflect the landscaped interior, Glamourlands shows how gardens and computer gaming can help escape from reality.

Last year, Tony Heywood was the artist in residence at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. Using the RHS colour chart, he matched the colours of more than 500 flowers including petunia and Narcissus displayed in the Great Pavilion and in the display gardens – 40 of them from the garden of Cleve West. This year, using a spectral analysis machine, paint company Dulux has recreated some of these colours in 300 litres of paint.

Tony’s next project is to pour this paint into a receptacle from a height and capture the paint on video as the colours fall through the air and mix together.

These videos will be shown in slow motion on nine screens next to the Fresh gardens. Tony has explained that at first sight it would appear that the screens are static blocks of colours but after watching them for a while the visitor will be able to see that the picture (or rather the paint) is in fact moving.