Funeral Flowers at RHS Chelsea 2025

A spectacular display of sustainable funeral flowers by The Farewell Flowers Directory has scooped a coveted Gold medal at the world-famous RHS Chelsea Flower Show. Meg was there to see it all unfold ...

Carole Patilla, Co-founder of The Farewell Flowers Directory said: “We’re so delighted that we did the thing people told us we couldn’t do: we took funeral flowers and a coffin to RHS Chelsea and won Gold! Our display shows that flowers, thoughtfully and sustainably designed, can move people; they can reflect and celebrate a life; and they can tread lightly on the planet. We hope that our Gold medal exhibit will raise awareness of sustainable funeral flowers and help bring about change in the industry."

The design idea was submitted a year ago. Reflecting on a traditional churchyard scene, based on a Yorkshire village, a man and his dog sit contemplatively, in a deep meadow of grasses, forget-me-nots and buttercups - figurative silver-birch pall-bearers raise a willow coffin at shoulder height and wonderful seasonal flowers erupt high above our heads.

Here is a link to the blog post that Carole has written sharing the story of the RHS Chelsea journey. 

Queen Camilla, a keen flower arranger and supporter of British-grown flowers, visited the Farewell Flowers Directory exhibit on Press Day as did King Charles, Alan Titchmarsh, Rachel de Thame, Kirstie Allsop amongst others.

The Funeral Flowers Directory is a listing service, which connects people to UK funeral florists who can offer beautiful, personal and fully compostable funeral flowers made without plastic floral foam or single-use plastic.

Meg said "We are so excited that The Farewell Flowers Directory has won an RHS Chelsea Gold medal for their spectacular display. It was brave and bold to take sustainable funeral flowers to the RHS Chelsea Flower Show when it had never been done before. Their moving display celebrates the beauty of personalised floral tributes and shows that good funeral flowers can be anything you want them to be. And they can tread lightly on the planet. We can decorate a pair of wellies, a wreath of vegetables to celebrate a keen grower, flowers from your garden or a clever arrangement that can be shared after the service. Flowers provide a point of beauty to focus on, and make the experience of funerals that little bit easier.”

These are the four members of the Farewell Flowers Directory team who designed and built the medal winning exhibit; Gill Hodgson MBE (Fieldhouse Flowers, Yorkshire), Carole Patilla (Tuckshop Flowers Birmingham), Georgie Newberry (Common Farm Flowers, Somerset) and Nicola Hill, (Gentle Blooms, Warwickshire). A team of a further 40 members of the directory have worked at the stand over the week starting conversations with the thousands of visitors to the show.

Meg is a proud member of this not-for-profit directory created by her good friends Gill Hodgson MBE  and Carole Patilla. She joined them to man the exhibit on Tuesday and was swept up in the celebrations. From the Grand Pavilion she 'went live' with Toni McDonald on BBC Hereford & Worcester's popular afternoon radio show. She was super excited to share the news with everyone at home in Worcestershire. Listen to the interview here.

Featuring exclusively British-grown flowers and foliage and completely free of any plastic, the installation demonstrates that you do not need to sacrifice beauty for sustainability. Already it is opening conversations at the show about what funeral flowers and funerals can be. The Farewell Flowers Directory exhibit is sponsored by the Institute of Cemetery and Crematorium Management (ICCM), The Green Funeral Flowers Online Course, New Covent Garden Flower Market and Workplace Bereavement.

Visitors to the exhibit were invited to write messages to their loved ones "I'd like my funeral to be ..." and these messages were tied around the edge of the scene. Moving, funny, meaningful, these were the start of conversations for many.

For more information you can visit their website here. The Farewell Flowers Directory is a not-for-profit that aims to remove plastic floral foam from funeral floristry. Its online listing service connects people to independent florists who can offer beautiful, personal and fully compostable funeral flowers. It was founded in 2024 by florists and flower farmers Gill and Carole and has over 190 member florists across the UK.

Plastic floral foam has become a significant environmental issue. It was first invented in the 1950s and quickly adopted by the floristry industry as a quick way to secure flowers in flower arrangements. The problem is that plastic floral foam is a single-use plastic and cannot be recycled. It will never biodegrade but breaks down into microplastics which contaminate the soil and watercourses.

Images above credited to The Funeral Flower Directory.