The Royal Horticultural Society has revealed the first details about gardens that will appear at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in 2026 at its Autumn Conference. For the first time, it appears that the show has no main sponsor.
Chelsea Flower Show 2026: where to get tickets, dates and what's on - everything you need to know
The flower show will feature 13 gardens in 2026 - nine large and four small. Here's everything we know about them so far.
Perhaps the biggest name of RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2026 is landscape architect Tom Stuart-Smith, who will be creating The Tate Britain Garden. This coincides with Tom's work on the Tate's brand-new Clore Garden (funded by the Clore Duffield Foundation), which he is currently planning, so his Chelsea plot offers a sneak peek at London's latest green space. The garden is set to be unveiled after next year's Chelsea Flower Show, in autumn 2026.
Back from winning Chelsea's People's Choice and Best in Show in 2025 with the much-admired Cha No Niwa Japanese Tea Garden, Kazuyuki Ishihara is returning to Chelsea in 2026, working alongside Paul Noritaka Tange on the Tokonoma Garden – Samumaya no Niwa. We're told the garden will represent the view from a small tea room and champion harmony, community and family.
RHS Chelsea veteran Sarah Eberle, who last designed a show garden in 2022, is coming out of Chelsea retirement (and celebrating her 50th year in horticulture) for The Campaign to Protect Rural England Garden 'On the Edge'. The garden will celebrate the overlooked countryside on the edge of our towns and cities, and so is set on undeveloped land and demonstrates nature's resilience with a fallen tree still able to support life.
Gardener and presenter Arit Anderson is working with Parkinson's UK to create 'A Garden for Every Parkinson's Journey'. Designed to be a peaceful and uplifting space for those living with and supporting those with Parkinson's, it will feature joyful, jewel-toned plants.
Darren Hawkes will create The Lady Garden Foundation 'Silent No More' Garden, honouring those diagnosed with one of the five gynaecological cancers. A wandering path takes visitors past richly planted borders and five sculptures, as part of a space designed to encourage conversation around women's cancers.
Garden designer Harry Holding and architect Alex Michaelis are joining forces to create a garden for the Eden Project called 'Bring Me Sunshine', which will include the use of clam crete, another Chelsea first. The garden marks the Eden Project's 25th anniversary, and will be co-created with young adults and feature a solar-powered outdoor classroom.
The garden will also offer a glimpse of Eden Project Morecambe in Morecambe Bay, a development on the site of a former seafront leisure complex featuring an Eden-like dome, set to open in 2028. Reflecting this project, the garden's planting will focus on salt-tolerant plants.
Harry Holding was last seen at Chelsea in 2023, when he created the 'School Food Matters' garden in the All About Plants category.
Following on from his 2025 ‘Save for a Rainy Day Garden’, Baz Grainger is designing another Chelsea plot supported by wealth management firm Killik & Co. His 2026 garden will be named 'A Seed in Time' and revolve around the notion of 'making more from less'. It will incorporate heritage crafts encouraging wildlife into gardens, and capture rainwater for times of drought.
Following her 2025 Raindance Garden, Catherine MacDonald is again working with Boodles to create 'The Boodles Garden' at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2026. This space will be inspired by much-loved features found in the four Historic Royal Palaces, which include The Tower of London and Hampton Court Palace. Fittingly, Catherine's plot will have a palette of jewel colours and use a romantic style of planting.
Max Parker-Smith will take visitors on an epic Australian train journey across the outback with his garden, 'Journey Beyond the Tracks From Adelaide to Perth'. One half of the plot will evoke the Western Australian outback, while the other will recreate the National Park City of Adelaide's green urban vision.
Rob Hardy is creating the Trussell's Together Garden, in reference to those coming together to support people on low incomes, and celebrate the positive impact of food banks. The space will feature intersecting paths and bright, colourful planting, as well as plants from the pea family (Fabaceae), which enrich the soil and support others.
Patrick Clarke is designing The Children's Society Garden with the aim of sparking optimism in the younger generation. It takes inspiration from the Japanese concept of ‘wabi-sabi’, the recrafting of discarded materials.
Joe and Laura Carey will again be supported by law firm Addleshaw Goddard for their upcoming Chelsea garden. 'Flourish in the City' follows on from the studio's 2025 'Freedom To Flourish' garden, which was inspired by the landscape of north Norfolk and looked to the mental health benefits of slowing down and having an unhurried lifestyle. As an homage to London's oyster trade, the 2026 'Flourish in the City' garden will feature oyster crete; a new material for RHS Chelsea.
Angus Thompson and Kate Binnie will work together on the Asthma + Lung UK Breathing Space Garden for the Project Giving Back scheme, which has extended its support into 2026. A 'breathing space' for reconnection with the natural world, this garden is set on a peaceful woodland edge, complete with pine trees for their natural antioxidants and immune-boosting qualities.
Read more about Chelsea Flower Show
- Discover the history of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show
- There's a way to get into the Chelsea Flower Show for free (and it's usually women who do it)
- Royalty at Chelsea Flower Show through the years
- You want to design a Chelsea show garden? Here’s everything you need to know
- How not to fail at the Chelsea Flower Show
In the Great Pavilion
Inside the Great Pavilion, the Sussex-based gourmet mushroom growers, Caley Bros are presenting a mushroom exhibit, while Flowers From the Farm, the trade association promoting sustainably cut flowers, are bringing a flower farm to the show.
What's the theme?
RHS Chelsea 2026 will focus on improving biodiversity in urban spaces and welcoming wildlife with carefully selected pollinator-friendly plants. We can expect to see gardens with calming, sensitive spaces, and symbolic planting and structures.
The RHS has also revealed there will be iconic and historical British structures, contrasting with several gardens adopting Japanese gardening techniques after the success of Kazuyuki Ishihara's Best In Show-winning Cha No Niwa Japanese Tea Garden in 2025.
What else is new for 2026?
Unusually for Chelsea, it seems there's no main sponsor of the show in 2026. Instead, the RHS is working with several partners, including The Newt In Somerset for its official cider and Pommery for Champagne and sparkling wine.