Sheffield mental health charity wins silver for container design at first RHS Chatsworth Flower Show

Diana Tottle and Emma Msisgiti of Sheffield's Sage Greenfingers with their silver medal-winning container at the RHS Chatsworth Flower Show.

Sage Greenfingers, based in Burngreave, entered a container into the 'perfect pollinators' exhibition at the recent RHS Chatsworth Flower Show.

More than 90,000 visitors attended the five-day event, which took place for the first time earlier this month.

They saw gardens and displays produced by some of the top names in horticulture - but also enjoyed the containers produced by charities such as Sage for the community competition.

The Sheffield charity's container, made with the help of members, was packed with colour and featured with a ceramic bug hotel with labels for every flower.

And it was not only visitors who were impressed - judges liked Sage's butterfly-based design enough to award it second place and a silver medal.

The charity said it was 'delighted' with the medal, with member David Taylor adding: "It was smashing - I feel great and proud to have been involved in the process."

Sage Greenfingers trustee Dr Will Carlile and staff member Emma Msisgiti collect their silver medal at RHS Chatsworth Flower Show.

Member Geoff Sheldon said: "Making the clay labels was different for us and enjoyable - the time really flew by."

And member Ken Lewis added: "You had to really concentrate not to make a mess of the labels. The end product looked better than I'd anticipated."

The Sage container was raffled off at an open garden event in Fulwood this weekend.

The University of Sheffield also took part in the first Chatsworth show, designing a garden that illustrated key points from a report on the impact of climate change on green spaces.

Mary Berry and Alan Titchmarsh at the show.

The design showed the need for gardens to be more flexible with respect to extremes of weather, such as excess rainfall and drought.

It included innovative ways to trap and store water, reduce the incidence of flooding and using excess run-off water to provide ponds to support wildlife.

Chapters within the 'Gardening in a Changing Climate' report, produced by researchers at the universities of Sheffield and Reading, were commissioned by the RHS.

Andy Clayden, who was responsible for the overall design of the garden, said: “This is a great opportunity to demonstrate how gardens can help alleviate some of the problems that will come with climate change, particularly in regulating water flow and supply across the urban matrix.

“It will also highlight how our lifestyles may change and how we may use the garden in a more dynamic, but also flexible manner to deal with alterations in the weather.”

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