Plants from award-winning RHS garden on way to Charlton school

Macmillan Cancer Support’s ‘legacy garden’ earned a silver medal at this year’s RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival – and much of it is now destined for a primary school in Charlton.

Created by London garden designer Sean A. Pritchard, Macmillan’s Legacy Garden tells the story of how leaving a gift in a will can help to provide support for people living with cancer in the future.  

The plants and flowers from the legacy garden will be given to Windrush School in Woolwich Road, Charlton, and Lindengate, a nature-based health and well-being charity in Buckinghamshire, to ensure their legacy can be enjoyed after the show.

Windrush School has been fundraising for Macmillan since 2008 after one of its teachers, Maralyn Willmot, who had been working at the school for 26 years, lost her life to cancer.

Having raised £70,000 over the 14 years, the garden designers have agreed to redesign the school’s own memorial garden for Maralyn, with the plants and flowers from the show.

The garden’s symmetrical design is meant to reflect how one act of kindness inspires another, and formal, straight lines echo the sense of structure and stability that Macmillan provides to people with cancer.

Elsewhere in the garden, a self-filling water feature symbolises the importance of giving to the continued vital work of the charity.

All the structures throughout the garden, including an ornamental pergola and benches, carried the message ‘gift the future’, encouraging visitors to consider what they can do today to inspire a brighter tomorrow for people living with cancer. 

Mr Pritchard, the Macmillan Legacy Garden Designer, said: “The opportunity to design a garden for Macmillan, a charity close to so many people’s hearts, was something I jumped at.

“The garden is a metaphor for Macmillan’s support and the role we can all play in giving.  It’s an honour to work on a design that aims to move people to act in the most positive of ways.

“Cancer has touched so many of our lives in some way, and I hope this garden gives visitors the space to contemplate how they can make a real difference to future generations affected by cancer by leaving a gift in their will for Macmillan.”  

Gifts in wills account for a third of fundraising income for Macmillan – which is based near Vauxhall Bridge. There are three million people living with cancer in the UK, with this number expected to rise to 4 million by 2030.

To find out more about leaving a gift in your will to Macmillan call 0300 1000 200 or visit macmillan.org.uk/legacies.

Pictured top: Sean A Pritchard’s award-winning garden at Hampton Court (Picture: Sean A Pritchard)