HOW would you celebrate your 40th wedding anniversary? A holiday? Romantic city break? Or perhaps a party with friends and family?

Well, one green-fingered couple are busy planning a garden design for the prestigious RHS Chelsea Flower Show.

Garden designer Julie Haylock and husband Andrew are Sandhurst Garden Design, based in Yeovil, and have been selected to compose a container garden at the show, which runs from May 22 to 27 in the grounds of the Royal Chelsea Hospital, in London.

Prior to retraining as a garden designer in 2016, Julie spent three decades as a member of support staff for Avon and Somerset Police.

How the couple’s garden is set to look

Andrew joined forces with her in the business in 2020 after retiring as an electrical operator at Leonardo Helicopters, Yeovil, where he worked for 38 years.

The pair will celebrate their Ruby Wedding Anniversary in September but before thinking about partying, they are focussed on preparing their garden delight.

Their effort – The Mary Anning Space to Learn Garden – is inspired by the famous fossil hunter, who was born on May 21, 1799, in Lyme Regis, Dorset.

“Mary’s gender, standing in society and lack of formal education were a barrier to her being fully credited for her geological discoveries that would, in time, provide hugely important evidence for scientists about our own evolution,” said Julie.

“In 2023 we celebrate the 200th anniversary of Mary’s discovery of the first complete fossil remains of a Plesiosaurus.”

The outdoor learning space the couple are planning is for a small group of primary school age children and uses nature, fossils, geology and plants to spark imagination and to inspire them with their studies and aspirations, ‘and like Mary prove that it is possible for an ordinary person to do extraordinary things’.

“Composition stone ammonites are set between the large crazy paving steppingstones, engraved with the tongue twister ‘She Sells Seashells on the Seashore’ – reportedly written about Mary – challenging the children to recite the rhyme as they step from stone to stone, leading them to discover the fossil remains of the Plesiosaurus,” Julie added.

“The hollow tree trunk containers that resemble volcanoes, normally a waste product of the forestry industry, are planted with Jurassic effect plants, including the Wollemi Pine a true living fossil dating back to the time of the dinosaurs and once thought to be extinct.”

And at the end of the show, elements of the garden will be relocated to Charmouth Primary School, in Dorset, to inspire future generations of scientists to follow in the footsteps of Mary herself.