Coolings Nurseries share their 100th birthday with the Chelsea Flower Show last week.

The centre created a 6ft (2m) high floral birthday cake to celebrate the double centenary.

Knockholt-based Coolings teamed up with the British Plant Nursery Guide (promoters of independent British Nurseries) on their Pavilion Way stand. The bespoke planter contained Coolings home grown favourites including white bacopa, lavandula ‘Regal Splendour’ and picea ‘J.W. Daisy’s White’. Paul Cooling and a team of experts offered expertise and advice to show visitors throughout the week. 

Coolings were also involved with other displays at the annual show, working with Marshall Murray, a Kentish supplier of sculpture and furniture from some of Britain’s finest artists, and the Sevenoaks Flower Club, who themselves are celebrating their Diamond Anniversary.

The centenary ‘cake’ will go on show at Cooloings Summer Showcase, which opens on Saturday 29 June. Locals know it as Knockholt’s ‘Chelsea’, where the centre displays many of the several hundred varieties of bedding plants grown on their 4.5 acre production nursery. Coolings still grow the majority of the plants they sell.