The Jamaican silver medal entry showcases an array of beautiful tropical blooms.- Contributed

Nation mines Silver-Gilt at Chelsea show

The Jamaica Horticultural Society (JHS) was awarded Silver-Gilt at the Royal Horticultural Society Chelsea Flower Show in London today for their Ode to Old Jamaica display of fragrant flora, plants and fruits.

Now in its 12th year of exhibition, the JHS display was led by Jamaican floral designer and horticulturist Pearl Wright who was delighted to receive the recognition from the Royal Horticultural Society. Pearl and the members of the JHS were not alone in their delight - they were joined by a modern day 'Captain William Bligh', over two centuries after he first visited Jamaica to plant the island's first botanical gardens.

The modern day 'Captain Bligh' was present on the stand during the show to highlight the bicentennial observance of the abolition of the transatlantic trade of Africans, as well as the Labour Day National Project to restore the Bath Botanical Gardens, and other ancestral sites associated with slavery, to their former glory. The Chelsea Flower Show which runs from May 21-27, coincides with Labour Day which falls on the May 23.

months of preparation

The Jamaica horticultural display, titled 'Ode to Old Jamaica - in the Footsteps of Captain Bligh', was the result of several months of preparation and is designed to recreate the original foliage found in Jamaica's Bath Botanical Gardens, established in the parish of St. Thomas, by the famed seafarer Captain William Bligh at the end of the 18th century. The display also features traditional fretwork - a hand-carved architectural design typically used in Jamaican plantation houses from the 17th to 19th centuries.

Bligh introduced breadfruit and over 1,000 other fruits, vegetables, herbs and fauna to Jamaica in an effort to ensure a sustainable food source for the enslaved men and women shipped to Jamaica during the 18th and 19th Centuries to work on the island's plantations. Captain Bligh planted Jamaica's first breadfruit plants in the Bath Botanical Gardens and was such an advocate of the plant's nourishing properties, that he became known as 'Breadfruit Bligh' throughout the Caribbean.

Visitors to the JHS stand during the Chelsea Flower Show are invited to learn more about Jamaica's rich heritage and tropical landscape.