A charity aimed at making fresh fruit available to all, will be in prime position alongside royalty, as it tries to spread its message in Windsor this weekend.
Freely Fruity, which plants fruit trees in public spaces, including parks and schools, has been given a show garden alongside one designed in part by Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh.
Every plant on the plot, from pear trees to herbs and a minitaure flower meadow, will be edible.
The circular garden at the Royal Windsor Flower Show is also meant to symbolise sustainability, with kitchen vegetable waste being returned to the soil to feed next year’s crop of fruit and vegetables.
The team have only had three days to build the garden in Windsor Great Park
The garden, named “The Goodness Within,” has been created with the help of Wokingham based designer Claire Evans.
“Everything in the garden will have edible properties,” she said. “There’ll be plants that you have in your garden that you might not know are edible and then there’ll be more traditional herbs and vegetables as well.”
Dominating the design are three pear trees, a reminder of the charity’s logo.
Freely Fruity was dreamt up “over a drink in the pub,” according to its three founders. Their aim was to make fresh fruit and vegetables more widely available.
With that in mind, they have provided fruit trees to local schools and planted orchards in public spaces where anyone can pick an apple for themselves.
The group got an invite to the show, whose patron is King Charles, after winning an award from him for their community work.
Pouring rain for the build was probably better than the previous week’s heatwave according to Ryan Simpson, one of the charity’s founders
The team battled with downpours to build the garden, earlier this week.
At its heart is a garden within a garden. The wooden-edged keyhole design has space to grow vegetables around the outside, with an inner section meant to accommodate kitchen waste, including peel and vegetable trimmings.
“As they rot down and mulch down, you water the garden through that section so all the nutrients then flow into the garden itself,” said Matt Knight, who constructed that part of the design.
It is all part of the charity’s wider messages of sustainability and food security.
Around 6,000 people are expected to see the garden during the course of the 119-year-old show.
However, missing on the day itself will be fellow garden creator The Duchess of Edinburgh and the show’s royal patron King Charles. The monarch visited last year but the 2026 event clashes with the wedding of Peter Phillips, the son of his sister, The Princess Royal, which is due to be attended by most of the royals.
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