Green Island Gardens In Ardleigh Wins RHS Partner Garden Of The Year Competition 2024

With over 200 RHS Partner Gardens in the UK and around the world, Green Island Gardens faced some extremely tough competition to win both the regional award for The Midlands and East Anglia and the overall title of Partner Garden of the Year out of the six regional winners.

Situated in Ardleigh, just outside of Colchester, Green Island Gardens has been open to the public for 25 years, but an RHS Partner Garden for just two years, joining the scheme in 2023.

For the first year in the scheme, garden owner and designer Fiona Edmond opted to not enter the competition in 2023 and instead focused on settling into the scheme and managing the responsibilities of being a Partner Garden. Having only entered Green Island into the competition for the first time in 2024, winning has come as a wonderful surprise and is true testament to how much love and work Fiona and her team put into the gardens. With only two regular staff members, a couple of amazing volunteers plus Fiona herself caring for the 20 acres of garden and woodlands, the small team are very proud to have been awarded such an honour.

Winning this award will not only attract more visitors to the gardens, but also generate interest in other local attractions as people discover some of the many other treasures in the area. Throughout the year the gardens host a variety of events including outdoor theatre performances, children’s school holiday activities and craft fairs showcasing locally made art, crafts and produce. In addition, next year will see Green Island’s first ever Plant Fair! All of the many small local businesses that participate in these events will benefit from the recognition that this award brings to Green Island.

Fiona says, “We are so excited to have won this award, especially since there was such fierce competition. We are immensely proud to be an RHS Partner Garden, and it makes all the hard work worthwhile when visitors really appreciate what we are doing here. It is an absolute pleasure to share what I have created with so many knowledgeable gardeners that have come to Green Island since we became an RHS Partner Garden. We are hopeful that what has often been described as ‘Colchester’s best kept secret’ for 20 years may become less of a secret once the news gets out!”

Staff from the RHS will visit Green Island Gardens in May to present the plaque, at which time members of the press are invited to visit with a photographer, and Fiona will be available to talk about the gardens.