Overview
- Organisers say the exception follows invitations to celebrities to hand-paint gnomes that will be auctioned to support the RHS Campaign for School Gardening.
- The move has been linked to King Charles’s fondness for gnomes at Highgrove, with a King’s Foundation horticulture lead citing his playful tradition in the stumpery.
- Cate Blanchett, Dame Mary Berry and Sir Brian May are among those approached, with the full list due next month ahead of the show.
- The gnomes will feature in the RHS and The King’s Foundation Curious Garden by Frances Tophill, an unjudged space with an oak ‘museum of curiosities’ and seven raised beds referencing David Beckham’s No. 7, destined to become an outdoor classroom after the event.
- This marks only the second relaxation of the rule after a 2013 charity exception, with the 2026 show scheduled for May 19–23 at the Royal Hospital Grounds.