Why Black History Month matters for gardeners
Award-winning designer Juliet Sargeant, the first Black woman to have a garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, shares her thoughts
The theme of Black History Month 2023, Saluting our Sisters, aims to acknowledge the crucial role of Black women in shaping history, inspiring change and creating lasting impact.
In 2016, Juliet Sargeant became the first Black woman to have a Fresh Garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show and received an RHS Gold medal and the RHS People’s Choice Award for The Modern Slavery Garden (pictured above).
She is passionate about raising public awareness of Black women of historical importance within horticulture. “With fewer than 75 percent of Britons able to name a Black person of British historical significance, I would guess that the number rises if the subject is horticulture,” she says. “Black History Month is an opportunity to spotlight the few, in the hope that, in the months and years to follow, light will fall upon the contributions of the many.”
Juliet with her award at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2016
She continues: “Shows like the RHS Chelsea Flower Show have a massive audience, and you can, in a very gentle and accessible way, quietly pop a subject in front of people when they’re feeling relaxed so that they can engage with it, whether they choose to or not; you’re presenting them with a subject in a digestible, accessible way.”
“I love the idea that you can use a garden space to tell a story. Like many art forms, a garden can capture your imagination and it can move you emotionally, particularly when a subject is difficult to get people to engage with, like modern slavery. If you somehow move people on the emotional level and they become engaged, interested, and moved by what they see, they’re more likely to engage intellectually and that’s what we wanted to do with The Modern Slavery Garden.
“We wanted to give people just a little sense of what it might actually be like to be a person in that situation and, once people feel something, they start to think, they start to wonder, ‘well, is there anything I can do about that situation?’
“We went to a lot of effort to invite influential people to see the garden at the show – politicians, faith leaders, journalists and movers and shakers. I think it probably did help to just keep the subject in their minds at a time when they were making big decisions about modern slavery.”
Juliet went on to design The New Blue Peter Garden, a Show Garden, for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2022, winning an RHS silver-gilt medal. The garden highlights the need to protect the soil. It has since been relocated at RHS Garden Bridgewater.
Other women making a difference today
RHS Vice President Baroness Floella Benjamin designed the Windrush garden display for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in 2018 to spotlight and symbolise the contribution of Caribbean people on British life. Afterwards the government agreed an annual Windrush Day and former Prime Minister, Theresa May, asked her to Chair a Windrush Commemoration Committee.
RHS Vice President and Ambassador, Baroness Floella Benjamin
Professor Nox Makunga is an award-winning South African botanist and science communicator at Stellenbosch University. She specialises in the study of medicinal plants. Her research into Dodonaea viscosa (sand olive) has found anti-cancer properties.
Dr Tanisha Williams is an American ecologist and botanist researching conservation and biodiversity with a focus on anthropogenic climate change. She founded #BlackBotanistsWeek, an online campaign to highlight, and create, a safe place for Black people who love plants.
Additional resources
► Black Girls with Gardens: Black Girls with Gardens (BGWG) is a collective dedicated to providing tips and inspiration to black women and women of colour who are interested in gardening.
► Gardening with the RHS: The legacy of the rose: Listen to our podcast dedicated to John Ystumllyn, an 18th-century African gardener in North Wales, who has had a rose launched to commemorate his life.
