Hampton Court "Show" to "Festival": What's in a name?

The world's largest flower show celebrated its 26th birthday with a rebrand. The Royal Horticultural Society's Hampton Court Flower Show became a "Garden Festival". Why? We were a bit skeptical.

Three marketing professionals make up this "we". We used to work together, love gardening and have been using Hampton Court as our annual reunion for a decade. We've done the RHS Chelsea Flower Show as well, either together or as individuals, but we've always loved the more laid-back, sprawling nature of Hampton Court. And, of course, the plant sales. There's no place better to find specialist varieties of everything and anything you might want to grow. It covers more than 34 acres, attracts more than 140,000 visitors per year and sells more plants per square mile than any other place or event in the UK.

One statistic in the RHS' media pack suggests a reason for the change: the average age of RHS flower show attendees is 55. Though 86% of them occupy the desirably affluent "ABC1" niche, that average age suggests a shrinking market. So the RHS has brought the British summer festival treatment to their blockbuster event, with more music, more shopping, more places to eat, drink and relax, adventure trails for children and a welcome to dogs on leads.

The only thing that's suffered is the show gardens. If that was your primary reason for coming to

Hampton Court, you're going to be disappointed. The "Festival" features fewer gardens; the event map implies there are loads, but many shown as gardens turn out to be displays in front of grower's stands. The sponsored and judged gardens were, on the whole, less impressive than years past. The message seems to be that if you want display gardens, go to Chelsea. Hampton Court is now about something else.

And that something is a chilled, garden-themed day of R&R. In many ways, the transformation was subtle. The layout of the show ground is essentially the same, the floral marquee remains unchanged and many vendors are in the same spots from which you've been buying from them for years. But taken together the RHS has created a very different event in just one year's transformation. Other than a few pinch points for crowds that they need to resolve (the rose marquee in particular was a nightmare), it was beautifully produced and appeared wildly successful.

The most obvious change is the music.

Music has been a part of the flower shows but it was always a bit of entertainment thrown on while you paused, exhausted, to re-charge your batteries. At both Chelsea and Hampton Court, the entertainment area was often the only place you could find to sit down. There are now four stages with musical entertainment at Hampton Court, and these acts aren't an afterthought. They're fantastic. We heard folky, acoustic guitar near the Floral Marquee. Energising pop on a floating stage in the
canal that divides the show in two. Classical guitar at another venue in the very heart of the show, next to a cocktail-shaking pop-up van, a face-painting salon and an art installation where you walked down a tunnel beneath videos of oversized blooms going through their life cycle in time-lapsed glory. A covered amphitheatre at the back, near the rose festival, appeared the biggest of all but was taking a break as we wandered by. There is even now a pianist entertaining shoppers in the craft marquee (always a magnificent spot to get started on your Christmas shopping).

All of these venues are surrounded by a much-welcomed increase in food and drink vendors and places to sit down. For the first time ever, we found chairs every time we wanted a break, and never waited in an excessive queue to quench hunger or thirst. Someone has clearly worked to increase the variety, too. In addition to the inevitable hog roasts, burgers and fish and chips, there were exotic wraps, cocktail-flavoured ice pops, smoked salmon bagels and, for those who planned ahead, the ability to pick up a Fortnum & Mason's picnic hamper to consume while listening to the acts on the floating stage. There's even a large, multi-point bottle refill station sponsored by Thames Water that ... for the first time in my event-going experience in the UK ... offered plentiful water without ridiculous queues.

For the first time, we agreed, Hampton Court has become something our gardening-ambivalent partners might enjoy.

I suspect that parents were thinking the same thing about their children. Fantastical figures on stilts now wander the show. There are adventure trails full of instagrammable photo stations. (We had to restrain ourselves from taking a photo with the Very Hungry Caterpillar. There's been some sort of gardening-related contest for schools at Hampton Court for years, but this year's bug hotel challenge was not only just as good as many of the "professional" displays but located at the very centre of the show.

I'm less sure about the appeal for dog owners. Hampton Court is still very crowded, and most humans find it a challenge to avoid getting stepped on or rolled over by the ubiquitous plant trolleys containing shoppers' treasures. My dogs wouldn't do well; Datchet and Bruno, at least, are best left at home.

All these changes have been implemented by a team with a sharp sense of design. The festival has a colour scheme (orange, slate blue, plum and an avocado green) carried through the grounds in bunting, pennants and stripped deck chairs. The RHS has also installed its own pop-up gardens throughout to add to the look of the place.

Wisely, they haven't tinkered with the one thing that's always been Hampton Court's USP: plant sales.  In fact, there seem to be even more nurseries than before, with both a packed Floral Marquee and plant "villages" at both of the main show entrances. This is the place for people on specific horticultural missions, as I was this year. My main hosta bed had two gaps that needed filling. (Thank you, New Forest Hostas, for Morning Star and Christmas Island.) And I had a new, small bed to plant from scratch. Wanting something different from the rest of my garden, I had decided on a mix of grasses swaying around an anchor rose, all in shades of bronzes, oranges and deep reds ... a distinct contrast to my mostly purple and pink garden. Mission accomplished, with the striking Peter Beales rose La Villa Cotta and a bunch of exotic looking grasses. (New plants in their new bed below. Not yet a show garden!)

Our opinion was unanimous: the Garden Festival is a change for the better. We didn't mind the de-emphasis on show gardens. (And there were enough there to maintain interest, particularly the people's choice award-winning Cancer Research plot.) We loved the more relaxed pace and the expanded scope. The big question now: do we let the boys in on some of our fun when our 11th annual outing rolls around? Stay tuned...