Your Gardens Competition
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Welcome to Your Gardens, the local gardening competition!
- The aim of the competition
- Categories
- How to enter
- Important dates
- Judging process
- Judging criteria
- Discretionary awards
- Your Gardens awards
- Competition sponsors and partners
The Your Gardens Competition recognises the efforts of the community in enhancing the local landscape and providing a quality environment. The action by the community links in with the council's commitment to sustainable development and improving the visual environment.
The competition aims to:
- Support the Take Pride in your Environment campaign
- Contribute to the Bracknell in Bloom 2011
- Enhance the appearance of Bracknell Forest
- Promote positive environmental behaviour
- Develop community pride
- Encourage wildlife
As always, the emphasis is on participation not competition!
- Front garden
From balconies to containers gardens and everything in-between, all must be visible from a road or footpath. - Community/neighbourhood garden
Communal areas, community centres, churches, parish offices and so on. If you are part of a winning team let us know! - Commercial premises
Calling on all local businesses, pubs, shops, and offices to make the most of your outdoor spaces and gain some valuable publicity for your efforts! - Young gardener
If you’re a budding gardener then this is the one for you. Gardens have to be created by young people but can be any size, from a postage stamp sized patch to a whole landscape! You must be under 16. - School Garden
If you are part of a gardening club or team at your school, put your horticultural skills to the test and be in with a chance of winning some great prizes. You must be under 16. 
Tallest sunflower
A bit of fun for everyone! Judged purely on height, sunflowers will be measured in early September.- Best kept allotment
Growing your own food on an allotment is a great way to keep fit and healthy outdoors. If your allotment is growing the seeds of success and you are enjoying the fruits of your labour, this is the chance to blossom!
The competition is now closed to entries.
Please note that the following applies to all categories EXCEPT Tallest Sunflower.
- Application
An application form MUST be completed in order for the garden to be considered a valid entry. It is not sufficient to supply name, address and category details. - Preliminary judging
All valid entries are visited and scored against the judging criteria listed below. Photographs will be taken. No appointments are made for visits and no prior warning is given. The only exception is for all young gardener(s) entries where visits are pre-arranged. - Shortlisting
On the basis of the completed application forms and the preliminary judging scores, entries are shortlisted to proceed to final judging. - Final judging
Final judging is done by committee at the end of July. The results are announced at the awards ceremony in September. - Tallest Sunflower Category
Once we receive your completed application form we ask you to send us the measured or estimated height of your sunflower by a date towards the end of August. We visit and verify the height of the tallest five sunflowers in early September. - Allotments
For the allotments category, 2 rounds of judging will take place and the accumulative scores will decide the winners.
Front Garden, Community/Neighbourhood Garden, Commercial Premises:
- Quality of floral display - Colour, form, composition, and horticultural practice.
- Quality of permanent planting - Variety, year-round interest, and scent.
- Quality of design and use of space - Imagination, use of colour, and depth.
- Contribution to the visual environment - impact on streetscene.
- Environmental consideration - Use of native plants, encouragement of wildlife, water conservation, peat free, chemical free, composting, and energy conservation.
School Garden/Young Gardener:
- Quality of plants and planting.
- Concept, design and use of space.
- Horticultural knowledge and skill
- Environmental consideration
- Effort and enthusiasm
Best Kept Allotment:
- Variety of crops/plants
- Quality of crops/plants
- Presentation of design and creativity
- Environmental sustainability
Tallest Sunflower:
- Purely judged on height.
Please note that we can only accept entries growing within Bracknell Forest Borough.
In addition to the main category winners, the judges will often give out special discretionary awards. These awards allow the judges to recognise individual areas of outstanding merit or innovation.
The lucky winners will be announced at the 'Your Gardens Awards' in October.
Competition sponsors and partners
Your Gardens is generously sponsored by Bracknell Forest Council, Bracknell Town Council, Longacres Nursery, The New Leathern Bottle and The Look Out, with media support from the Bracknell Forest Standard.
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