Chelsea SEEDLIP Garden celebrates apothecary origins

A conceptual Artisan garden at the 2017 RHS Chelsea Flower Show, designed by Dr Catherine MacDonald, celebrates the 17th century apothecary origins of modern day pioneering approaches to distillation.

The Seedlip Garden, is inspired by the story of SEEDLIP, the world’s first distilled non-alcoholic spirits brand and illustrates a 350 year-old journey with a significant proportion of the plant list informed by a 17th century book, “The Art of Distillation”.

Apart from those plants influenced by the 17th century book, the garden also contains species relevant to modern or herbal medicine and species that suit the SEEDLIP colour scheme of grey, green and copper such as Artemisia abrotanum, Baptisia ‘Cherries Jubilee’ and Euphorbia griffithii ‘Dixter’.

This book inspired Ben Branson, founder of SEEDLIP Drinks, on his journey to create the world’s first distilled non-alcoholic spirits in order to solve the dilemma of ‘what to drink when you’re not drinking‘ and continue his family’s 300 year legacy of farming.

Key features include a lightweight metal and oak structure with copper detailing laboratory style benches and pipe work, the symbolic copper centre piece will detail SEEDLIP’S story from book to bottle.

The path that will wind through the garden represents part of a copper condenser coil, a key element in the distillation process both in the 17th and 21st centuries.

For SEEDLIP’S founder, Ben Branson, being selected for the RHS Chelsea Flower Show is a dream come true: “With design by Dr Catherine MacDonald, build by Landform Consultants and plants from Hortus Loci we have a world class team and the perfect platform to showcase our story,” he says.

Designer Catherine MacDonald is no stranger to Chelsea. Lead landscape designer at Landform Consultants Ltd., her first show garden at Chelsea as a solo designer, ‘The Hartley Botanic Garden’ was awarded a Silver-Gilt.

SEEDLIP offers a sophisticated alternative when not drinking – each product combines six individually-distilled ingredients, blended and bottled in England, sugar-free and sweetner-free.

Garden design ©Catherine MacDonald.