Chelsea in Bloom turned an ordinary shopping trip into a walk through flowers, fairy tales and London shopfronts in May 2015. I had set out for coffee and a replacement Smythson card holder. By the afternoon I was following a floral trail around Sloane Square, with a map in my hand and a rather more interesting day than I had planned.
From the Roberts London archive. The original film was published on 26 May 2015. The displays, shops and services described here belong to that visit.
Workshop Coffee before Chelsea
The morning began in Clerkenwell with a takeaway from Workshop Coffee. In the film I explain why I kept returning: I enjoyed the coffee, and I bought their beans to use at home too. Even with the same beans, I admitted that their team made a better cup than I did.
Coffee in hand, I took the Tube from Farringdon towards Sloane Square. I chose a route through King’s Cross and South Kensington, largely because changing trains felt more interesting than sitting on the Circle line. It was a personal preference rather than a claim to have found the quickest journey.
A new Smythson card holder on Sloane Street
The original reason for visiting Chelsea was practical. My old Smythson card holder had been a Christmas gift, and after roughly two and a half years of daily use its stitching had begun to come undone. I had liked it enough to go back for another.
At the Sloane Street shop I chose a black leather card holder with three pockets and a small blue stitch along one edge. The shop was also taking part in Chelsea in Bloom, with flowers surrounding the entrance.
Watching the gold embossing
When I was offered personalisation, my first answer was no. I wanted to use the card holder straight away and assumed embossing would mean sending it elsewhere or returning another day.
Instead, there was a workbench in the shop and somebody ready to do it there. I was told I could come back in about fifteen minutes. The possibility of watching the process changed my mind, and the team kindly let me film it.
I chose my initials in gold. As somebody interested in making, I enjoyed seeing that last small piece of craftsmanship added on Sloane Street. A routine purchase became a memorable experience because I could see the work being done.
As I made clear in the original vlog, I paid for both the card holder and the embossing. This was my own shopping trip.
Chelsea in Bloom’s fairy-tale streets
I had arrived during Chelsea Flower Show week, but this film follows the displays around the streets rather than a visit inside the RHS show. In Sloane Square I discovered the Chelsea in Bloom information point, picked up a map and found part of the square transformed into a fairy-tale setting.
The theme for the 2015 competition was fairy tales. Retailers had decorated their storefronts, and the route gave me an excuse to explore beyond the shop I had come to visit. There were decorated rickshaws, a pop-up bar and a Mad Hatter’s tea-party scene over in Duke of York Square.
It was also market day there. The food stalls and the smell of cooking made it difficult to stay focused on the flowers for long.
Flamingos, gardens and favourite displays
The original film records the announced awards: Sarah Chapman for Best Floral Display, Smythson as Highly Commended, and Kate Spade New York for both the Innovation Award and People’s Champion. Kate Spade’s pink flamingos were among the displays I stopped to film.
My own interest went beyond the prizes. I noticed a Jo Malone window whose wording credited gardeners from Putting Down Roots. I also admired the commitment at No.11 Cadogan Gardens, where building work and scaffolding had not stopped the floral effort.
Liz Earle’s display caught my attention for another reason: it invited people into the scene. Visitors were waiting to have their photographs taken among the flowers. In the vlog I reflected on how effectively a display could connect with people when they became part of it.
The walk also took me past familiar names including Browns, Brunello Cucinelli and Links of London. The camera catches a small record of Chelsea’s shopping streets as they looked that spring, from elaborate entrances to quieter window displays.
A small errand that became a London day out
What I like about this film is how little of the day was planned. Coffee and a card holder were enough of a reason to leave the house. Watching the embossing and finding Chelsea in Bloom supplied the rest.
The closing walk reaches the river, bringing the afternoon back to a wider view of London. The full vlog preserves the journey, the shop visit and far more of the floral trail than a handful of photographs can show.
