The Marble & Granite Centre, one of the UK’s major stone wholesalers, is to sponsor a garden at the 2016 RHS Chelsea Flower Show, taking place this year 24-28 May.

The garden, designed by artist stoneworkers and lettercutters Martin Cook and Gary Breeze, is named ‘Antithesis of Sarcophagi’. It features a 25ton granite cube set in a barren landscape. It appears at first sight to be a ‘garden’ with neither flowers nor plants. However, on closer inspection Chelsea visitors will discover that by peering through slits in the granite cube a beautiful regenerating woodland garden is revealed to them.

Martin Cook won a prestigious Gold medal for his previous RHS Chelsea exhibit – The Mindfulness Garden – in 2013. That was also sponsored by The Marble & Granite Centre. The stone wholesaler was so thrilled by its success that it was keen to work with Martin again.

“I have long been a supporter of Martin and his work,” says Stephen Pike, the Managing Director of The Marble & Granite Centre. “Both Martin and Gary have a unique ability to take a natural material, already a beautiful thing, and turn it into something truly special. I’m looking forward to watching the garden develop and to sharing it with visitors to the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in May.”

Martin says of his latest garden: ”We’ve taken to referring to our garden as ‘granite not gladioli’. Our aim is to turn the traditional concept of a Chelsea garden on its head. In our garden, gratification is delayed rather than instantly rewarded. Closer inspection will most definitely reap rewards for show visitors.”

'Antithesis of Sarcophagi' will be exhibited in the Fresh Gardens section of the show.