Laois native supplied flowers to gold medal-winning garden at Chelsea Flower Show 2026

A LAOIS man supplied flowers to a gold medal-winning garden at the Chelsea Flower Show 2026, which took place from 19-23 May.

Stradbally native Richard McKenna, who is managing director of the Kent-based plant nursery Provender, was approached by Rob Hardy to grow plants for his Chelsea Flower Show entry ‘Trussell’s Together Garden’. An ode to togetherness, the garden celebrates food banks and the communities that come together to support low-income families.

According to the RHS website, the theme of togetherness is integrated into garden’s design, with intersecting paths, a shared seating area, and “a reciprocal frame structure made from individual timbers interlaced for strength and stability”.

“These elements represent how communities can hold each other up and come together to create a stronger whole”, the website reads.

“[Rob] had the idea, the garden design”, Richard tells the Laois Nationalist.

“He submitted it to the Chelsea Flower Show with us as a proposed supplier of plants to the garden. When he had the green light and he got a spot at Chelsea by the RHS [Royal Horticultural Society], then we sat down and talked in more detail”.

In the planning stages Richard and his team sat down with Rob to discuss the plants he would use in his garden. The plants chosen are a unique combination of colour and texture, designed to create both contrast and harmony.

“We try to put as much detail [as possible] on all the plants”, he says. “We went through the lists line by line; they gave me a specification of plants I needed. We sourced some of the plants abroad in Germany, some came from Holland.

“We got them all in in December and January, and we potted them all up in the pots, stuck them in the tunnels, and prayed that they came into leaf and flowered in time”.

Richard found the spring weather in 2026 to be a challenge: “I've been working in horticulture for 30 years. I don't ever remember having three frosts in May before. We've had three frosts this year, which makes growing plants very challenging for the biggest show in the world.” 

Richard lived in Stradbally as a child but moved to Naas at 16 when his father sold the family farm. “He asked me did I want to be a farmer, and I said that I love the land, I love being outside, but I don't want to be a farmer”, Richard recalls. He has since grown a career in horticulture in the United Kingdom.

Richard also met Irish President Catherine Connolly at the Chelsea Flower Show; she was visiting as part of her first official state visit to Britain. They had a brief chat, but President Connolly was “on a tight schedule”, Richard says.

Trussell’s Together Garden will be relocated to Strabane Foodbank in Co Tyrone.