HOW does she do it? A professional gardener from near Whitchurch has bagged her 17th gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show.

Rosy Hardy, who owns Hardy’s Cottage Garden Plants, in Freefolk Priors, with her husband Rob, discovered on Tuesday that they had won the top prize for their 10m by 10m marquee exhibit.

The spectacular creation at the country’s premier horticultural show in London, included a water feature, metal swing seat and a walk-through path.

Rosy, who had already won more gold medals than any other woman, before this week, said: “It has not been the easiest of years and the build up to the show, as everyone knows, was dismal with no sun, too much rain, and even two weeks ago, we really were unsure as to how we were going to pull all this off.

“To have 17 gold medals is just fabulous, and winning them just increases our desire to keep the standards high. We are very proud to represent the county of Hampshire at the show and hope to continue doing so for years to come.”

This year, Mrs Hardy opted to show off her new osteospermum, ‘In The Pink’, which was launched by Geraldine Somerville, perhaps best known for playing Harry Potter’s mother in the films. The living legend of horticulture also displayed the new leucanthemum ‘Freak!’.

The sweet smell of success also followed other north Hampshire growers. The third-generation nurserymen Mark Straver and Robin Wallis own Hortus Loci, in Hook and have grown plants for three gold-medal winning show gardens at their first attempt – including Cleve West’s best-in-show.

Hortus Loci only began trading in October, and Mark said he was delighted with the outcome.

He added: “This year’s long, cool spring may have proved an added demand, but we have certainly enjoyed the challenge of raising thousands of herbaceous plants for several of the main show gardens at this year’s Chelsea. The icing on the cake is, of course, Cleve winning best in show.”