Spring has finally sprung and excitement is building as Yorkshire counts the days until it hosts the Tour de France Grand Depart.

Everyone it seems has caught tour fever, including the organisers and exhibitors at Harrogate Spring Flower Show who are preparing to add a little joie de vivre to their displays, by celebrating pedals as well as petals.

Staged at the Great Yorkshire Showground, the event will feature beautiful show gardens created especially for the event by talented designers, including some with a Tour theme.

Rated Britain’s best gardening event by Which? Gardening, the spring show will host Britain’s largest exhibition of floral art.

Among the painstakingly-prepared designs will be flower arrangements themed On Your Bike and floristry celebrating Vive le Velo where large displays, created by flower clubs across the country, will take visitors on a trip to Europe, through famous book titles such as A Year In Provence and Driving Over Lemons.

With more large-scale designs than ever before, this year’s gardens will offer plenty of ideas and inspirations to suit a wide range of homes and tastes.

New for 2014 is a Pocket Gardens competition to showcase community projects across the region.

These displays will be one metre by one metre plots offering a window into the exhibitor’s work for thousands of visitors to the show. Each pocket garden will be awarded Gold, Silver or Bronze, with prizes for the top three.

Children’s activities include hands-on fun in Gardening with Nature. Budding gardeners are invited to put their green fingers to work by learning everything from how to sow seeds to turning Yorkshire yellow for The Tour with a team from RHS Harlow Carr.

Also planned are willow weaving, mini-wormeries, wildlife-themed crafts and a Spot It show trail.

Then there is the popular Have a Go feature which has been expanded this year to offer chances to try floristry techniques as part of the floral art demonstrations, as well as learning new gardening skills with students from the Askham Bryan College Harrogate Centre.

As ever, there will be live entertainment at the show, featuring talks, tips and gardening chat in the Dig It Garden Theatre, together with expert growing advice from the Kitchen Garden LIve team.

Chefs at the Plot to Pot Cookery Theatre will also present a daily menu of delicious dishes.

“The spring show is the first big event in the UK gardening calendar and we are looking forward to getting the season off to a great start,” says show director Nick Smith. “The Yorkshire start of the Tour de France is a huge occasion for the region and, with the help of our exhibitors, we hope some of the tour-themed activities at the flower show will also help to get visitors in the mood for a memorable summer.”

So too will thousands of high-quality garden products, unique handmade crafts, lovely gifts and specialist regional foods.

If the sun shines – and surely the weather cannot be as bad as the year before last, when heavy rain forced an early closure on the final day of the show – you can also sit back with a drink or ice-cream and watch the crowds go by, or listen to the strains of jazz, brass or even a pipe band on the bandstand at the heart of the show area.

You’ll probably want some kind of refreshment during your day – the show can be an exhausting, but rewarding, experience – and there is plenty to tempt you, from ice-cream kiosks to cafes and plenty of choice in the food marquee.

There are lots of free parking spaces around the showground, which is signposted from the centre of Harrogate and also routes into the town, and with courtesy buses running from the car parks through-out the day, the show is accessible to all.

Many people prefer to save their visit to the final day of the show, Sunday, when crowds of green-fingered visitors leave with their arms full of prize-winning plants and flowers they have managed to buy from stands in the traditional big sell-off. The only concern then can be how on earth you pack everything into the car, or onto the bus, to get back home again!

The Harrogate Spring Flower Show promises to be the perfect day out for garden lovers and shoppers alike. Make sure you don’t miss it.

Matt Clarke

Factfile

  • Harrogate Spring Flower Show runs at Great Yorkshire Showground, Harrogate, from Thursday, April 24, to Sunday, April 27.
  • Tickets Thursday-Saturday £14.50 booked before April 15; £17 on the gate. Sunday £12.50 in advance or £13 on the gate.
  • For more information, visit flowershow.org.uk or call (01432) 546157.