Chelsea Flower Show hosts first-ever same-sex wedding in 110 year history
It looked absolutely beautiful!
A couple have become the first same-sex pair to get married at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show after tying the knot yesterday (22 May).
Manoj Malde and Clive Gillmor held a Hindu wedding with coordinated traditional dress in pink and blue.
Photos show the pair celebrating after getting married in a civil wedding, which took place at the Eastern Eye Garden of Unity.
RHS judge Alexander-Sinclair told PA: “It’s a Chelsea first and Chelsea one-off – it’s not something you expect to happen at a flower show.
“Isn’t it a glorious idea?”
“Isn’t it a glorious idea? Somebody who actually designs this garden about bringing people together, then gets married [in] it. It’s a nice way to connect the whole thing.”
Malde, who is a presenter on BBC show Your Garden Made Perfect, designed the garden himself, and thanked the RHS for their help.
“It took us 18 years to get engaged, but in our minds we’ve always been married to each other. Today, we’re making it official,” he told the Evening Standard.
“The RHS have been amazing. If I had to do all the wedding organisation as well as the guardian build, I would have been a broken man.
“The build is always very stressful but everything has gone to plan,” he added.
The couple have reportedly been together for over three decades.
Malde acts as the RHS’ Ambassador for diversity and inclusivity. He wanted to create a garden to promote horticulture for everyone, everywhere.
Bright posts positioned around the garden with sentences in braille. This demonstrates that gardens and gardening are for everyone regardless of race, colour, creed, sexuality or disability.
Hexagonal slabs are another feature of the garden, which its creator said represent a broken society.
He added to the RHS: “But when a broken society comes together, it is stronger. So those slabs, although they are separated, together they act as a path, representing that stronger society.”