andy’s chelsea diary: purbeck stone
At the RHS Chelsea Flower Show this year we are using Purbeck stone for the garden and for some of the benches.
Purbeck is a sedimentary rock laid down in shallow freshwater and lagoons during the Jurassic period. So, for Chelsea we are having the sides of these stone seats polished so you can clearly see how the rock is formed in layers of sediment. You can almost read its age like the rings on a slice of a tree trunk. But we will also leave some parts of the stone rough so that visitors can enjoy the contrast in textures between the cut and uncut stone.
Down at the Lovell’s quarry in Dorset they find fossils regularly, on a recent visit we saw this dinosaur footprint. It’s always fascinating to see these finds and they remind you of the history that’s written in the stone.