Irish designer's Garden for Human Rights wins silver medal at Chelsea

Irish garden designers Diarmuid Gavin and Paula Ryan have won a silver gilt and silver award respectively, at the Chelsea Flower Show in London.

Diarmuid Gavin is no stranger at Chelsea having already picked up a silver gilt medal at the 2005 show, and presented BBC television coverage of the annual event.

However, this is the first time Paula Ryan, originally from Blackrock, Co Dublin, has received an award.

Her design of a roof-top garden was commissioned by Amnesty International. It will now move to the roof of the Amnesty building in London "to create a tranquil place for the people of Amnesty and contribute to the greening of the city".

Ryan, who recently moved to Italy where she is developing her own one-acre garden, said she was expanding her international client base and her latest projects include a large country garden in Long Island and a Manhattan roof terrace.

She said she was "thrilled" to win the award. "I was really, really pleased," she added.

"I don't really believe in 'the next big thing' . . . but then every year at Chelsea you see how the Zeitgeist effect manifests in a theme that several people have been working on individually in the previous year."

The annual Chelsea Flower Show organised by the Royal Horticultural Society is considered to be one of the world's great horticultural competitions and exhibitions. Held over five days each May in the grounds of the Royal Hospital Chelsea, attendance is limited to 171,000 visitors per day and tickets are sold out many months in advance.

Gavin's winning entry was designed around a studio garden for an older couple. "They are affluent, dynamic and interested in all the arts, including gardening. They enjoy the natural world, but live in suburbia. They love to be creative, whether that is writing their memoirs or painting scenes inspired by nature," he explained.

The studio is actually two studios in one - his and hers. The interlinked structure is intended to symbolise the way in which the couple's lives have been intertwined.