RHS Chelsea Flower Show’s magical rainforest garden finds forever home

The Wildlife Trusts’ British Rainforest Garden to go to Bristol Zoo Project

Following the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, The Wildlife Trusts’ British Rainforest Garden, which has been funded by grant-making charity Project Giving Back, is finding a forever home at the Bristol Zoo Project.

Run by conservation and education charity Bristol Zoological Society, the zoo is set within 136 acres of woodland and meadow landscape. The garden will inspire visitors to fall in love with temperate rainforests – one of the UK’s rarest and most precious habitats.

Inspired by the ambitious 100-year mission of The Wildlife Trusts and Aviva, the UK’s leading insurer, to bring rainforests back to the western edges of the UK, the garden’s legacy will be a permanent educational space just outside Bristol.

Computer generated graphic depicting The Wildlife Trusts' British Rainforest Garden coming to RHS Chelsea 2025, including several tall trees, a walkway with a wheelchair user at one end and another visitor sitting on a log just off the path. Also includes a small waterfall and mossy boulders around the edges.

This will be more than a garden: it will be a living classroom, a spark for future conservationists, and a celebration of the fantastic wildlife found on our own doorstep.

Visitors will follow a path through boulders and fern-lined trails, under a canopy of native trees created from hazels, field maples and silver birch from the show garden.

Boulders and dead wood will evoke the ancient woodlands which once cloaked our western coast and seating will provide a space to soak up the shade.

Lush undergrowth, lichen-encrusted trunks, honeysuckle and ivy will bring the rainforest to life and ferns will thrive in the dappled light.

The British Rainforest Garden is due to open to the public at Bristol Zoo Project in October in the Sanctuary Garden, which explores the importance of gardens and natural habitats as places of health and wellbeing for people, as well as essential for the future of wildlife.

Justin Morris, Chief Executive of Bristol Zoological Society, says:

“We are extremely excited about the arrival of the British Rainforest Garden later this year. It will fit perfectly into our Sanctuary Garden. This area will form the beginning of a new ‘gardens’ biome at Bristol Zoo Project. Visitors will be encouraged to pause and reflect on the value of gardens and natural habitats as places of health and wellbeing, and to consider how they can take action to protect wildlife in these precious environments.”

Garden designer Zoe Claymore says:

“I am absolutely delighted that our British rainforest garden has a forever home at Bristol Zoo Project. The chance to educate the next generation of conservationist and gardeners is truly a huge honour and I and my team are proud to play a part in this. Our thanks go to The Wildlife Trusts, Project Giving Back and Aviva for giving us the opportunity to promote the incredibly important habitats our native rainforests support and we look forward to sharing the garden with Bristol Zoo Project visitors later this year.”

David Schofield, Sustainability Director, Aviva, says:

"We are excited that The Wildlife Trusts British Rainforest Garden from this year’s RHS Chelsea Flower Show will be rehomed at the Bristol Zoo Project. This garden highlights Aviva’s commitment to nature's recovery and our place-based approach to building stronger, inclusive communities where everyone can experience nature and its benefits, helping the UK get ready for the future.”

Kathryn Brown, Director of Climate Change and Evidence at The Wildlife Trusts, says:

“How magical to rehome this little rainforest garden in a place already loved by generations of families. Children will love playing among the trees – and as their canopies spread and the moss and lichen green the rocks, it’ll come to feel like Harry Potter’s enchanted forest.”

The garden has been designed to be low carbon, with no concrete, clay, peat compost or virgin wood used in the design. All plants (including trees) are sourced from UK nurseries using peat-free compost.

The garden is sponsored by Project Giving Back and supported by Aviva. Visitors are invited to see the garden at site number 340 throughout Chelsea week from Tuesday 20th May to the final day on Saturday 24th of May 2025.

Editor's Notes

The Wildlife Trusts are making the world wilder and helping to ensure that nature is part of everyone’s lives. We are a grassroots movement of 46 charities with more than 940,000 members and 39,000 volunteers. No matter where you are in Britain, there is a Wildlife Trust inspiring people and saving, protecting and standing up for the natural world. With the support of our members, we care for and restore special places for nature on land and run marine conservation projects and collect vital data on the state of our seas. Every Wildlife Trust works within its local community to inspire people to create a wilder future – from advising thousands of landowners on how to manage their land to benefit wildlife, to connecting hundreds of thousands of school children with nature every year. www.wildlifetrusts.org

Zoe Claymore
Zoe Claymore is a garden and landscape designer based in southwest London. From her studio, her small team crafts bespoke outdoor places that resonate emotionally with clients - while staying mindful of environmental responsibility. Named RHS Horticultural Hero 2023 and a triple award-winner at RHS Hampton Court, Zoe draws on personal, cultural, environmental, and artistic inspirations to shape her teams’ designs. A regular media contributor and public speaker, Zoe advocates for innovative, sustainable, and deeply personal landscaping solutions which stand the test of time. www.zoeclaymore.com

RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2025: the world’s greatest flower show will run from 20th - 24th May 2025 at London Gate, Royal, Hospital Road, Royal Hospital Chelsea, London, SW3 4SR. Find out more and book tickets here: www.rhs.org.uk/shows-events/rhs-chelsea-flower-show

The Wildlife Trusts’ British Rainforest Garden will be built by award-winning landscaping company Frogheath Landscapes. The plants are being grown by specialist nurseries and two Plant Heritage national collections are collaborating on the project, including members of the British Fern Society, and Stone Lane Gardens which is home to the national collections of birch and alder.

Bristol Zoo Project is owned and run by conservation and education charity Bristol Zoological Society. Located near J17 of the M5, it’s home to animals from around the world including giraffe, cheetah, red panda, zebra, deer, ostrich, gelada baboons and lemurs. It also includes the award-winning Bear Wood, which is home to brown bears, lynxes, wolverines and wolves. To deliver its mission of ‘Saving Wildlife Together’, the Society is creating a new, modern conservation zoo with immersive animal habitats. Currently, 85% of its animals are both threatened and part of targeted conservation programmes, and the Society’s aim is for this to rise to 90% by 2035. Bristol Zoological Society works in nine countries, across four continents, directing 20 field conservation projects that conserve and protect some of the world’s most threatened species. Visit www.bristolzoo.org.uk for more information.

Project Giving Back is a unique grant-making charity that provides funding for gardens for good causes at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. PGB 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.

PGB will fund 10 gardens at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in 2025 and intends to fund a total of 60 gardens inspired by a range of good causes from 2022 to 2026.

PGB aims to boost UK-based good causes by giving them an opportunity to raise awareness of their work at the high-profile RHS Chelsea Flower Show, as well as supporting the relocation of the gardens to permanent homes after the show where they can continue to benefit the charities and their communities. Find out more at www.givingback.org.uk.

Aviva is the UK's leading diversified insurer and they operate in the UK, Ireland and Canada. They help 19.6 million (as at 31 August 2024) customers make the most out of life, plan for the future, and have the confidence that if things go wrong they’ll be there to put it right. Aviva have been taking care of people for more than 325 years, in line with their purpose of being ‘with you today, for a better tomorrow’. In 2023, they paid £25.6 billion in claims and benefits to their customers. In 2021, they announced their ambition to become Net Zero by 2040, the first major insurance company in the world to do so. www.aviva.co.uk/