Western Cape village of Stanford to host South Africa’s winning Chelsea Flower Show exhibit

Leon Kluge, the Franschhoek-based designer of the Chelsea Flower Show exhibit. (Photo: Sven Musica)

By Liz Clarke

29 Jul 2024

The award-winning Chelsea Flower Show protea and fynbos exhibit is returning to its roots.

In a floral coup, South Africa’s protea and fynbos exhibit at the 2024 Chelsea Flower Show in London, where it won a gold medal and awards for best design and best exhibit in the Grand Pavilion, will be replicated on home soil, down to the last detail.

In all, 22,000 flower stems will be used to create the heady sensory fynbos aroma that those who visited the Chelsea Flower Show in May experienced.

There will be no shortcuts, says Leon Kluge, the Franschhoek-based designer of the Chelsea Flower Show exhibit, who has chosen the Western Cape village of Stanford as the venue for the “Chelsea Flowers in Stanford” display from 21 September to 6 October.

Kluge will personally replicate and oversee the Stanford version, which will be created from scratch in an empty shell of a building on Queen Victoria Street.

Stanford Chelsea Flower Show Photos: Sven Musica

“South Africans will get the full 100-square-metre impact of textures, cracked clay arches, proteas, pincushions, restios, colours and scents that captured the imagination of the world at Chelsea,” Kluge says.

According to the design team, the exhibit was inspired by the Cape mountains and features an abundance of plant species from the Cape Floral Region. The design vision was to group plants that grew on the dry side of the mountains and showcase those that thrived on the wetter side.

Stanford Chelsea Flower Show Leon Kluge Leon Kluge, the Franschhoek-based designer of the Chelsea Flower Show exhibit. (Photo: Sven Musica)

A fitting tribute

Bringing the winning fynbos exhibit home to the place and people who live in the fire-driven fynbos biome of Stanford and whose livelihoods are tied to the natural beauty of Cape flora feels like the right way to celebrate the win at Chelsea, says Kluge.

“After all, it’s the flowers that are the stars of the show.”

Fynbos is known to last well once cut, so their display and colours will easily last two weeks (even longer if properly cared for). For this reason, say the designers, the exhibit in Stanford will look as stunning on the first day as it will on the last.

Read more: South Africa’s long and hard road to the Chelsea Flower Show

Funding for the recreation of the Chelsea Flower Show stand has come from Grootbos, a World Heritage fynbos sanctuary on the Cape Whale Coast. It was part-sponsor of the London exhibit.

Chris Lochner and Bulelane Bashe from Grootbos, who participated in building the South African exhibit in London, will help with the weeklong building of the exhibit, along with students from the not-for-profit Grootbos Foundation. DM

This story first appeared in our weekly Daily Maverick 168 newspaper, which is available countrywide for R35.

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