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Chelsea in Bloom 2023

Lights! Camera! Action! This year’s theme is ‘Flowers on Film’

6 April 2023

The streets of Chelsea will bloom with extraordinary fresh flower displays inspired by this year’s cinematic theme, ‘Flowers on Film’. 

From Monday 22 May to Sunday 28 May, Sloane Street will be transformed as Chelsea in Bloom blossoms throughout the neighbourhood. Over 80 boutiques, hotels and restaurants will be decorated with extraordinary fresh flower displays inspired by characters, films, plots and the glamour of the red carpet during awards season. 

Chelsea itself is no stranger to the screen. One of the first-ever moving pictures was created by William Friese-Greene, the father of cinematography, on the King’s Road – and the area has been starring on the big screen ever since, in films including A Clockwork Orange, Withnail and I, A Good Year, Woody Allen’s Match Point, and 2012 Bond film Skyfall

James Bond creator Ian Fleming actually lived in Chelsea, on Cheyne Walk, while Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula, lived nearby. Oscar Wilde, whose works have also been made into films, was famously arrested at The Cadogan Hotel on Sloane Street and Jane Austen was a regular in the neighbourhood. 

Expect eye-catching displays celebrating the icons, the genres, the classics (Four Weddings and a Funeral, perhaps, Monty Python?), the new releases (Barbie, we’re looking at you), and – hopefully – a few tributes to some of the characters that have defined British cinema, like Bridget Jones, who is a bit of a style icon this season, Harry Potter and Paddington Bear.

Running parallel to the Chelsea Flower Show, Chelsea in Bloom, London’s largest free-to-attend festival of flowers, is produced by Cadogan in association with the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS). This year’s event will see over 80 local businesses taking part by adorning their storefronts with gloriously creative, world-class floral art in the hope of winning the top prize, judged by an expert panel, with the winners being announced on Tuesday 23 May. 

The People’s Champion Award will be chosen by open voting from the end of Monday, 22 May on the dedicated Chelsea in Bloom website. Voting will close at midnight on Thursday 25 and the winner announced on Friday 26 May.Further details will be announced soon at chelseainbloom.co.uk, where you will be able to stay up-to-date with all the exciting floral goings on in the neighbourhood.

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