The Plant Heritage Missing Collector Garden

We're thrilled to be creating an All About Plants show garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in May 2026 

The Plant Heritage Missing Collector Garden is bringing plant conservation to the heart of the world’s most famous flower show. It's been designed by William Murray, Kate Campbell and Sally-Anne Rees of the Planting Design Collective and sponsored by Project Giving Back, with additional support from Shanly Foundation.

The Plant Heritage Missing Collector Garden

The Planting Design Collective

About the garden

The Missing Collector Garden is a woodland edge garden, filled with plants safely looked after in our living library of National Plant Collections® as well as those looking for someone to take care of them. We aim to inspire more people to get involved in plant conservation as a National Collection holder or Plant Guardian, or to support our work in other ways. Collection Holders from across the UK are contributing their plants and expertise including Geum, Boehmeria, Rubus and Thalictrum. The garden will also include plants not yet safely in a Collection such as Aquilegia, Verbascum and Deschampsia grasses. 

Help us save more garden plants for the future

Why are we doing a Chelsea garden? And why do people become a Collector?

One of our trustees and host of the 'Our Plant Stories' podcast has been following some of the preparations for our garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. 

Episode 1: Gwen, our CEO, and the Planting Design Collective - Kate, Sally and Will - discuss how the project started. Listen here

Episode 2: Sally meets Plant Heritage volunteers who play a vital role in the charity's work and are lending plants for the Missing Collector garden. Listen here

Episode 3: 'The Chair Farmer' - Sally meets Gavin and Alice Munro of Full Grown who have literally grown the chair featured at the heart of our Missing Collector garden with meticulous pruning and training. Listen here.

Meet the people bringing the Missing Collector Garden to life

About Project Giving Back 

Our garden is sponsored by Project Giving Back, a unique grant-making charity that provides funding for gardens for good causes at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. It was launched in May 2021 in response to the Covid-19 pandemic and its devastating effects on UK charitable fundraising - effects that have since been exacerbated by the cost of living crisis.   

Project Giving Back is funding 11 gardens at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in 2026 making a total of 62 gardens inspired by a range of good causes from 2022 to 2026.   

About Shanly Foundation  

Shanly Foundation is kindly providing additional support to Plant Heritage for our RHS Chelsea Flower Show exhibit in 2026. Shanly Foundation is a grant-giving charity funded by the Shanly Group of companies. Since 1969, Shanly Foundation and Shanly Group have contributed over £30 million to those in need of a helping hand, from youth clubs, schools, and woodland projects, to centres for adults with physical and learning disabilities. These good causes are primarily within the southeast of England but at critical times the Foundation also makes donations to worldwide disaster funds. 

Find out more

Would you like to become a National Collection holder, or to support our work in other ways? Get in touch today. We'd love to hear from you. 

Contact us

THE HOME OF THE NATIONAL PLANT COLLECTIONS®

eg: plant genus, common name, county, collection holder name.