The Royal Horticultural Society has officially opened applications for show gardens at its 2027 events, and for anyone working in landscape design or simply passionate about garden planning, this is a moment worth paying attention to. The RHS show garden programme is one of the most influential platforms in the world for shaping residential landscape design, planting design, and the broader direction of how people think about their outdoor spaces.
Each year, the gardens displayed at RHS shows set the tone for what homeowners, designers, and garden enthusiasts will be reaching for in the seasons ahead. From low maintenance garden design to drought tolerant garden design and native plant garden design, the ideas that debut on these show stages often find their way into backyards and front yards across the world within a few years.
Designers and design teams interested in creating a show garden for the 2027 season can now submit their applications through the RHS. The process is competitive and requires applicants to present a clear design concept, demonstrate their experience in planting design and outdoor space creation, and show how their garden will contribute something meaningful to the conversation around modern garden design and sustainable landscaping.
The RHS evaluates proposals based on creativity, horticultural quality, and the ability to inspire. Gardens are expected to reflect real ideas that people can take home, whether that means xeriscape garden design principles, pollinator garden design, rain garden design, or thoughtful approaches to water wise landscaping and fire resistant landscaping. The goal is not spectacle for its own sake but genuine inspiration for residential landscape design and everyday yard landscaping.
Applications are open to professional designers, design studios, and collaborative teams. The RHS provides detailed guidance on what each category of garden requires in terms of size, budget, and design intent, so applicants can plan accordingly before committing to the process.
It might seem like a stretch to connect a prestigious horticultural show to a small backyard design project or a front yard landscaping refresh, but the connection is very real. Show gardens have historically introduced ideas like lawn alternatives, garden edging ideas, landscape lighting ideas, and privacy landscaping to a much wider audience than specialist publications ever could.
Martin Palma, founder and CEO of Ecolandscape Studio, has followed the RHS show garden programme for years and sees it as a reliable indicator of where residential landscape design is heading. In his experience, the concepts that appear on show stages tend to reflect what clients start asking for within one to two seasons, particularly around low maintenance garden design, outdoor living space design, and patio landscaping ideas that balance beauty with practicality.
The 2027 cycle is particularly interesting because the broader design conversation has shifted significantly toward ecological responsibility. Designers applying now will likely be working with ideas around native plant garden design, drought tolerant planting, and water wise landscaping, not as niche choices but as central design strategies. Homeowners who are already thinking about their yard landscaping design in these terms are ahead of the curve.
For anyone planning a home garden design project in the next few years, watching what gets selected and built for the 2027 shows is genuinely useful. The gardens that make it through the RHS process tend to be the ones that translate well into real residential settings, which means the planting combinations, the material choices, and the structural ideas are worth studying.
If you are working on a backyard landscaping project, considering a front yard redesign, or thinking about how to make your outdoor living space more functional and beautiful, the RHS show garden programme gives you a preview of where thoughtful landscape design is going. The application window is open now, and the results will be worth following closely when the 2027 season arrives.
