Miss Pettigrew lives for a day

Big lights, noise, expensive leather soled shoes - I have been to London. I have spent the last 3 days working along side Chris, his team and Lindsay Anglin on the 'Dawn Chorus' Chelsea garden. I arrived nervous and very unsure of what to expect and with some trepidation of what I had to live up to. Lucky for me the whole team was very welcoming and once I spotted Chris deep in the planting we had a chat and I set to it. I hope I settled in nicely and proved to be helpful.

I had a fantastic and rare opportunity to look at the flower show behind the scenes and I have to say it was an inspiration. I looked very closely at the way materials are used and with out giving anything away Luciano Giubbilei & Ulf Nordfjell's garden have given me hours of thought about how they work with landscape materials alongside plants and how to challenge myself.

I learnt a few priceless lessons from Chris and a wonderful lady called Nina, who I hope I have made a friend in. In all it was a fantastic trip topped of by meeting up with Claire Potter on Friday and taking a few minutes (sorry really hours) off to look around along with popping into Potterton Books in Chelsea and purchasing Gardens of the Loire Valley through the seasons by Marie-Francoise Valery.

I will be back at Chelsea, with Sean, on Wednesday to have a look around at the worlds most prestigious flower show, in all her finery.