Woweeee the shops around Chelsea have really excelled themselves with their floral decorations in honour of The Chelsea Flower Show this year. The results are truly spectacular as the shops compete to win the coveted Best Floral display for Chelsea in Bloom. This year's theme is Fairy Tales, which my daughter of course adores and we have spent most afternoons this week checking out the shop displays. Here are some of our favourites:


The huge pink flamingos outside last year's winner, Kate Spade are extremely impressive but it's only when you put two three year olds next the display that you realise exactly how enormous it actually is.

There were tons and tons of people taking photos and quite a few of them got annoyed at E and my niece for wanting take a look up close at the displays. To begin with this irked me because we were only spending a minute or two at each installation. Then I noticed that one of the women huffing and puffing had just wanted us to move so she could photograph her own kids, she spent aaaages there. I then thought to myself - the displays are there to be seen and experienced up close, there are heaps of perfect photos on Instagram already if that's what you want. So, we allowed the girls to enjoy the displays, without actually touching the flowers - and ignored all the miserable 'tutters'!


The girls were enthralled by the 'poison apple' display outside luxury florist Moyses Stevens and the fairy garden next door at Basia Zarzycka.







Just around the corner on Sloane Street there were gorgeous purple butterflies and toadstools adorning the entrance to Smythson.





But our absolute joint favourites and the displays that get our votes were side by side at Browns and Bruno Cucinelli. At Bruno Cucinelli the girls discovered enormous toadstools, a Cheshire cat, the white rabbit and the mad hatter's tea party. This installation was truly magical and equally stunning was the Cinderella themed display next door at Browns complete with a floral version of Cinderella's blue ball gown, a glass slipper and the golden carriage. We'd seen a similar display a few days earlier outside LK Bennet which was also pretty impressive but I think Browns' version slightly pipped them to the post.






Fluttering fairy wings at Rag & Bone on Sloane Square:



Further on down, Sloane Square had been transformed in to a green and floral wonderland with magic mirrors scattered around.





There were a few 'Alice in Wonderland' themed displays (which E is quite in to at the moment as I mentioned in yesterday's post) but curiously we hadn't caught sight of Alice herself, until we reached Duke of York square...... and there was the lady herself, serving Pimms from a giant teapot- who knew! E and cousin M waved at her and she came bounding over, she was super friendly and happily posed for a photo with my starstruck girlie and my niece. The girls were both uber excited and it was the perfect end to our walk.


We all absolutely adored visiting the floral displays this year and it really made me think that despite all the negatives of living in the centre of a huge bustling city there really are some magical moments which we most certainly wouldn't find anywhere else in the world. I have lived in Chelsea for a long long time and I am ashamed to admit that I have never been to the flower show so it's up there on my to-do list for next year!