This weekend, Sussex nurseries will travel to Borough Green in Kent to exhibit and sell their plants at the two-day Great Comp Garden Summer Show (9-10 August).
While Kent may be ‘the Garden of England’, Sussex is proving that it’s a county that’s home to some of the best specialist nurseries in the UK with tree and plant nurseries winning back-to-back medals at the world’s most famous flower shows and taking their home-grown plants to festivals across the south east.
Miles Japanese Maples of Storrington in West Sussex will be taking his award-winning maple trees grown on his nursery in Sussex. In May, Miles was awarded his second consecutive silver gilt medal at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. Miles Japanese Maples were the focus of Monty Don’s attention in the famous Great Pavilion at Chelsea in 2024 with Monty describing them as “fantastic”.
Miles will be taking his range of trees to Great Comp Garden’s two day Summer Show this weekend. He says of Great Comp: “It’s a great show with lots of fantastic plant nurseries in attendance, plus they have live jazz and people stay for the day to enjoy the atmosphere.”
Paul Seaborne, owner of Pelham Plants in Laughton East Sussex is known for his gold-medal winning display at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in 2024, and he will also be packing up his van and making the journey from Sussex to Kent with his perennial plants.
Paul Seaborne says: “Great Comp Garden is a special place with the salvias, rosemary and woodland areas – and all the plants we grow in Sussex and sell on the nursery are wonderfully reflected in the landscape there in Kent. We love the maturity of the established plantings at Great Comp and it’s a great woodland edge garden on the sandy ridge that runs through to Sevenoaks. Pelham Plants is a woodland edge garden too and we grow plants that can tolerate the dry of the summer, root competition from the trees and dappled light, so it’s the perfect place for us to take our Sussex-grown plants to sell to visitors to the Summer Show.”
Great Comp Garden’s Summer Show 9-10 August 10am – 5pm (last entry at 4pm). Admission details; www.greatcompgarden.co.uk
