Chelsea offers green answer to pressures of social media

LOUD video games and non-stop social media are not the sort of phenomenon normally associated with the gentle and refined surroundings of the Chelsea Flower Show.

But one show garden recreates these modern pressures to illustrate how growing plants can help deal with increasing stress among children.

Visitors to the show, which opens this week, will enter the Miracle-Gro garden through a timber house which recreates the environment experienced by many young people, from constant interruptions from social media, to phones ringing and noisy video games.

But on leaving the din of the house visitors enter a haven filled with sunflowers, roses, peppermint and sweet peas, designed to stimulate each of the five senses. The garden’s designer, Vicky Page, said the contrast shows the benefits for young people in spending more time outdoors.

It comes after YoungMinds, the charity backing the garden, and a member of Heads Together – the mental health campaign spearheaded by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry – highlighted the fact that an estimated three children in every classroom suffer from a diagnosable mental health problem.

Amber Cowburn, campaigns manager at YoungMinds, said: “Spending time outdoors, taking up a hobby, being with friends and family, talking about how you’re feeling, eating well and time out from their daily routine can be incredibly beneficial.”

Ms Page added: “We’re incredibly proud that our design delivers an important message. Our garden will help more people to enjoy the positive effect green space can have on mental health. We are very excited to see how the public responds to the multi-sensory experience and hope they come away with some ideas about how to integrate a positive outdoor space at home, or simply just try to enjoy what they have.”

The Miracle-Gro garden is being built with the help of patients from HighGround, a charity which provides horticultural therapy to ex-servicemen at Headley Court’s Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre in Surrey.

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