President Catherine Connolly braves 'Galway weather' at the Chelsea Flower Show
President Catherine Connolly with her husband Brian McEnery and Irish sculptor Donncha Cahill at the Chelsea Flower Show. Pictures: Tony Maxwell
The organisers of the annual Chelsea Flower Show found themselves apologising to President Catherine Connolly for the bad weather.
The rain showers were starting and stopping, and the aptly named Keith Weed, president of the Royal Horticultural Society, noted the drizzle had stopped for her arrival.
“It’s Galway weather,” President Connolly responded. “A soft day.”
However, she did question whether she had worn the right shoes for the occasion, gesturing down at her navy heels.
Mr Weed had to “dash” to the BBC, leaving President Connolly to explore the magnificent, colourful gardens.
The first garden she visited was the Trussell’s Together Garden, designed by Rob Hardy and Co, which Irish supplier Provender Nurseries had worked on.
Rachel Lees said the project had been worked on for over two years and will be relocated to a food bank in Strabane, Co Tyrone, in the coming weeks. It will be the first Chelsea garden to be in Northern Ireland.
The large “reciprocal” wooden frame features parts built upon parts. If one piece is moved, the whole structure will fall. It shows the importance of having support, she explained.
“The community over there are so excited to have it. Our food bank team are being called the Chelsea girls in the street,” she said.
The garden won a gold medal at the show, with Ms Connolly spending nearly 15 minutes speaking to some of the Irish people who participated in the project.
She chatted with the organisers in hushed tones, with the journalists straining over bushes and doing their best not to trample on flower beds to hear what she was saying, to little avail.
Many of the people at the event were bemused by the entourage walking through the flower show.
“Who is that?” one English journalist asked the Irish media.
Another woman was overheard saying she felt out of place among the crowds of Irish people.
The president also managed to bring a little bit of Gaeilge to the event as she made her way through.
“My mum will love this,” one woman remarked as they posed for pictures with the president.
They then started conversing with Ms Connolly as Gaeilge, telling her they were from Báile Átha Cliath.
Read More
This continued as she arrived at the London Irish Centre in Camden. Seamus MacCormack, chief executive of the centre, started their conversation in Irish, before accompanying her into the building.
Inside, there was a range of Irish delicacies awaiting, including an array of Cadbury chocolate bars, Kimberly biscuits, and Club Orange and Lemon, but not rock shandy.
In her speech, she once again paid tribute to the Irish diaspora living in London, noting the London Irish Centre in Camden celebrated its 70th anniversary just last year.
She said it offered a “safe, warm, and inclusive place for many to socialise”, and it was a “home away from home” for many who use the services.
Going off script, she spoke passionately about survivors of institutional abuse, saying her own life had been “entangled with survivors on a personal or professional level”.
Referencing a Dáil debate from 1991, she spoke about a report that set out the “condition and status” of Irish emigrants in Britain, including their survival rate was lower than that of other immigrants.
“The official response from Ireland was a little slow in catching up, to put it mildly, in relation to that exodus from our country,” she said.
“I’ll leave that for the politicians to meditate on.”
While Ms Connolly has avoided being overly political in her first six months in the Áras, any of her off-script moments have focused back on the topics she was passionate about in the Dáil.
Because much like the reciprocal frame at the Trussel Garden at the Chelsea Flower Show, those beliefs are intertwined with who she is as Uachtarán na hÉireann.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
