Plant Heritage launches its Missing Collections 2025 campaign
Plant Heritage is set to return to RHS Chelsea Flower Show this year, where excitingly, the charity will launch its Missing Collections 2025 campaign. The annual campaign highlights plant groups that aren’t currently part of a National Plant Collection, and without someone to care for them are at risk of becoming lost.
The charity will also celebrate the beauty of the National Plant Collections at Chelsea, with two National Plant Collection Holders exhibiting for the very first time. These will be showcased alongside stunning specimens from several other National Plant Collections, ranging from striking Sir Cedric Morris irises to colourful Cosmos.
Iris ‘Benton Olive’; Paeonia ‘Lemon Chiffon’ and the ‘Ben’ series of azaleas which will be displayed at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2025. Credit Sarah Cook, Clare Austin Hardy Plants and Glendoick Gardens.
The Missing Collections 2025
Plant Heritage will launch 12 pollinator friendly plant groups at Chelsea and will call for passionate gardeners to consider starting a National Plant Collection of one of them in order to protect them long-term. By taking on a Missing Collection, new Collection Holders will not only play an active – and much-needed – role in plant conservation, but they will also join Plant Heritage’s vibrant community of fellow gardeners with a love for growing, sharing and saving plants.
The 12 plant groups in need of a home are: Armeria, Arbutus, Campanula, Erysimum, Festuca, Osteospermum, Paeonia (tree), Pittosporum, Silene, Trollius, Vinca and Zantedeschia. Beautiful examples of some of these plants will be displayed at Plant Heritage’s stand.
To see the full list, visit: www.plantheritage.org.uk/national-plant-collections/missing-collections-2025/
More Missing Collections will be showcased RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival in July.
Gwen Hines, CEO of Plant Heritage, said: “The National Plant Collections are an amazing way to protect the UK’s favourite garden plants for the future. Through our network of passionate members and dedicated volunteers, we are safeguarding 95,000 different plants, but we need to do more and to adapt to climate change. We hope to inspire new Collection Holders to come forward this year and give a new plant group a home.”
National Plant Collections in the Plant Heritage zone at RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2025
Visitors to the world-famous flower show can find Plant Heritage within the Floral Marquee’s Plant Heritage Zone, at stand GPB 020. The theme of the charity’s display is ‘Help us protect our beautiful plants’ showcasing Geums, Heuchera, Lathyrus, Baptisia and Streptocarpus.
First-time exhibitors to Chelsea include Newby Hall, whose Cornus collection will represent the huge plant diversity in the Yorkshire hall’s grounds. An eye-catching Cornus kousa tree will form the centrepiece of the display, underplanted with woodland herbaceous species.
The second Chelsea debutant is part of Glendoick Gardens’ Rhododendron collection, which is home to Europe’s second largest rhododendron breeding programme. New varieties will be displayed at the show including those bred for colour foliage, the latest evergreen azaleas and deciduous azaleas inspired by Scottish mountains.
A beautiful selection of Sarah Cook’s Iris (Sir Cedric Morris Introductions) collection will be displayed alongside prints of the watercolour paintings from the Florilegium, showing the relationship between art and gardening. Just last month Sarah was awarded a VMH for her outstanding contribution to horticulture.
Other collections on display include 25 bearded irises from Clare Austin Hardy Plants which will showcase the development of flower form and colour over the past 100 years. Alongside them sits a selection of Clare’s early flowering peonies, perfect for a late spring garden. Jonathan Sheppard will launch new Cosmos cultivars such as ‘Fondant Fancy’, and a range of fabulous foxgloves from Terry and Mary Baker’s unique collection can also be admired.
Plant Heritage has also teamed up with Frank P Matthews Trees which recently announced that their striking ornamental tree Prunus ‘Crystal Falls’® has been shortlisted for the coveted Plant of the Year 2025 at RHS Chelsea Flower Show.
To find out more about Plant Heritage and the charity’s important conservation work, visit www.plantheritage.org.uk