Inner Temple Garden

The Inner Temple Garden is a three-acre historic space in London where Shakespeare set the legendary rose-plucking scene that sparked the Wars of the Roses in Henry VI. Established originally by the Knights Templar in 1195, the garden also hosted the Royal Horticultural Society’s Spring Flower Show from 1888 to 1911, which eventually became the Chelsea Flower Show. Decorative 1730 wrought-iron gates feature the winged horse emblem of the Inner Temple.

London · from the walk “Secret London: Hidden Alleys, Ancient Stones & Forgotten Stories” · audio ~3 min · Generated

Inner Temple Garden, Crown Office Row, London EC4Y 7BB

Which famous flower show originated in London's Inner Temple Garden before moving to Chelsea in 1911?

You're standing in one of London's best-kept secrets... a three-acre garden hidden in plain sight, just steps from the roar of Fleet Street. This is the Inner Temple Garden. And the story of this place stretches back over Eight hundred years.......... The Inner Temple was established by the Knights Templar in eleven ninety-five. These warrior monks, freshly returned from the Crusades, built their church and hall right here on the banks of the Thames. Where this garden now spreads its green lawns would have been marshland running down to the river... used to grow vegetables for the kitchen and herbs for medicine.......... The first recorded gardener was appointed in thirteen oh seven — one of just twenty or so people living in the entire Temple at the time. Think about that. Seven Centuries of continuous gardening on this very soil.......... But here's why this place truly matters to English history — or at least, to English Legend. Shakespeare set the Temple Gardens as the scene in Henry the Sixth, written around fifteen ninety-one, where the Wars of the Roses begins. In that famous scene, noblemen spill out from the hall into this very garden, too heated to argue indoors. Richard Plantagenet plucks a white rose... the Earl of Somerset picks a red one. And just like that, sides are drawn for a civil war that would consume England for thirty years.......... Now, the Inner Temple Library itself notes that Shakespeare's story "has not yet been corroborated by contemporary evidence." The rose-plucking may be pure theatrical invention. But the garden leans Into the legend — this otherwise undocumented event is commemorated by a rose bed alternately planted with roses representing the Houses of York and Lancaster.......... And the surprises don't stop with Shakespeare. In eighteen eighty-eight, the Royal Horticultural Society chose this site to stage its Spring Flower Show. They returned each year until nineteen eleven, when the show's increasing popularity forced the R-H-S to find a larger home... the Royal Hospital at Chelsea. That's right. The world-famous Chelsea Flower Show was Born right here, beneath your feet.......... During the Second World War, the garden took a significant toll. Rubble from the badly damaged surrounding buildings was gathered along the borders, and a barrage balloon named "Shirley Temple" was positioned in the middle of the lawn. Even in wartime, this place kept a sense of humor.......... Look for the ornate wrought-iron gates as you wander through — they were erected in seventeen thirty and feature the Inner Temple's winged horse, the Pegasus, alongside the Gray's Inn griffin. Nearby you'll find a sundial dating from seventeen oh seven.......... Near the pond, keep an eye out for a small lead statue of a boy from nineteen twenty-eight, by sculptor Margaret Wrightson, inscribed with a quotation from Charles Lamb's essay: "Lawyers, I suppose, were children once." A perfect little reminder... that even the most serious place in London was once a playground.

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