Dame Judi Dench shed a tear yesterday after being presented with a seedling from the famous Sycamore Gap tree.
The centuries-old landmark, situated next to Hadrian’s Wall, was chopped down by vandals last year.
At the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday, the veteran actress wiped her eye as she received the seedling from seven-year-old Charlotte Crowe of Henshaw CE Primary School in Northumberland.
Of the seedling, she said: ‘I’ll be naming him Antoninus, the adopted son of the Emperor Hadrian.’
The National Trust said Dame Judi is ‘passionate about trees’ and had been ‘very concerned by the news of the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree’.
Dame Judi Dench shed a tear yesterday after being presented with a seedling from the famous Sycamore Gap tree from seven-year-old Charlotte Crowe of Henshaw CE Primary School in Northumberland
At the Chelsea Flower Show yesterday, the veteran actress said of the seedling: ‘I’ll be naming him Antoninus, the adopted son of the Emperor Hadrian’
The centuries-old landmark, situated next to Hadrian’s Wall, was chopped down by vandals on September 28 last year
The seedling – grown from seeds taken from the tree felled last September – will be planted in the Octavia Hill garden at the show, commemorating the founder of the National Trust.
It will then rejoin other seedlings to continue to grow at the Trust’s National Conservation centre in Devon.
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The King also made an appearance at the show, where he was labelled the ‘King of the Compost’ by schoolchildren in a badge in honour for his environmental work.
Meanwhile, other well-known faces at the show include Lady Amelia and Lady Eliza Spencer, Princess Diana’s twin nieces, aged 31, who grew up in South Africa. Bake Off stars including Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith were also in attendance.
The world-famous spectacle – which has been running for 111 years – saw a clash of ancient and modern yesterday in the competition for coveted gold medals, as well as the accolade of best in show.
They included the modernistic garden featuring futuristic metal spouts, and for
Traditional tastes were catered for with a garden designed by landscape architect Robert Myers for St James’s Church, Piccadilly, which was designed by Christopher Wren and consecrated in 1684.
The recreation of the church walls at the show required each individual brick to be handpainted to recreate the look of the central London building. Mr Myers said: ‘We wanted to create the atmosphere of a church in the gardens at Chelsea, and the best way we could do it that was have the background of the church, and the iconic Wren window.’
The King looked delighted to be back in action today as he visited a garden designed by children at Chelsea Flower Show today
Lady Amelia Windsor looked very summery on Monday as she debuted her first-ever display at the Chelsea Flower Show
Lady Amelia Spencer and Lady Eliza Spencer (right) made chic appearances
Daisy Edgar-Jones brought the A-list glamour to the Chelsea Flower Show at The Royal Hospital on Monday afternoon during the VIP and press preview day
This year at the Chelsea Flower Show, all the large gardens have gone through a ‘green audit’ as part of efforts to reduce the event’s environmental footprint
The Sycamore Gap tree was cut down in the middle of the night and fell on the other side of the ancient Roman wall
The National Trust have left a framed sign beside the fenced off stump which reads: ‘This tree stump is still alive. If we leave it alone it might sprout new growth, please respect the barrier’
Through a technique called clonal propagation, it could be possible to save the Sycamore Gap Tree, allowing it to live on far into the future
Meanwhile, a garden by designer Tom Massey, for the charity WaterAid, comprising rusty, whirlpool-like spouts represented the modernist aesthetic at the show.
Mr Massey said of the spouts: ‘They are representing water running down a plug hole’.
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He added that the intention of the show is to make people more aware of the need to reduce the use of water, but also in countries such as India where changing weather conditions mean fresh drinking water is becoming scarcer.
Saving water is a theme of the Chelsea Flower Show, which will receive 151,000 visitors this week before closing on Saturday.
Environment Minister Rebecca Pow said that government buildings should make better use of rainwater – including ‘using it to flush toilets’.
She told the Daily Mail: ‘Some departments have done very well at reducing their usage of water and that is exactly the kind of thing they should be looking at.’
Meanwhile, one garden attracting attention yesterday was the Glasshouse Effect garden, a recreation of the glasshouse at HMP East Sutton in Kent, part of a project which trains women inmates in horticultural skills.