If you’re new to gardening and want an easy way to keep your flower beds looking great and blooming longer, the Chelsea chop might be just what you need. This simple pruning trick helps many popular garden plants grow bushier and flower later in the season, and gardeners of all abilities can do it. The team at British Garden Centres have put together a guide on what plants work best with the Chelsea chop and how you can do it to bring a second blooming period to your outdoor space.

What is the Chelsea Chop?

The Chelsea chop is a pruning technique named after the famous RHS Chelsea Flower Show, which takes place in late May each year. This is the traditional time to carry out the chop, but the method can be used anytime from mid-May to early June. The idea is simple: you cut back certain perennials by about a third to half of their height to encourage the plants to become bushier, delay their flowering, and help them thrive throughout the summer.

Why do it?

There are many good reasons to give your plants in your garden the Chelsea chop to keep it looking neat and tidy. First, it helps control the size of your plants, preventing them from becoming too tall and leggy as they grow. This means you won’t have to stake them as often, and they’ll be less likely to flop over in the unpredictable summers of the UK in wind or rain. Pruning your plants now also encourages the plant to branch out, resulting in a fuller, more attractive shape and often more flowers.

The Chelsea chop can also delay some plants' flowering, so you can spread out your garden’s colour display, ensuring you have beautiful blooms well into late summer and early autumn. Another benefit is improved plant health as removing old growth allows for better air circulation, which helps prevent diseases within your plants.

Plants to give the Chelsea Chop

The Chelsea chop works best on a wide range of late-flowering perennials and some shrubs. June is the best time to prune plants, including phlox, penstemon, upright sedum, aster, echinacea, helenium, achillea, campanula, coreopsis, rudbeckia, leucanthemum, hardy geraniums, Stachys, veronica, and even some salvias.

How to do it

To carry out the Chelsea chop, you’ll need a sharp pair of garden secateurs or shears. Make sure your tools are clean to avoid spreading disease between plants as you chop. Before you start the pruning in your garden, take a moment to check for any nesting birds or other wildlife that might be hiding in your plants.

When you’re ready, cut back your chosen plants by about a third to half of their current height. Make your cuts just above a set of leaves or buds, which encourages new growth from that point. You can cut back the whole plant, which will delay flowering for the whole plant by four to six weeks, or just some of the stems as this staggered approach will give you flowers at different times throughout summer. We recommend leaving enough leaves to support the plant’s energy needs.

After pruning, give your plants a good watering and consider applying a liquid plant feed to help them recover and encourage strong, healthy growth.

Julian Palphramand, Head of Plants at British Garden Centres, said:
“Early June is the sweet spot to prune some of the plants in your garden, and the Chelsea chop is a simple way to make sure your outdoor space is thriving throughout summer. This simple pruning method can dramatically improve the appearance and health of your gardens, so get chopping now!”



British Garden Centres (BGC) is the UK’s largest family-owned garden centre group with 73 centres around the country. The group is owned and led by the Stubbs family, who also own and operate Woodthorpe Leisure Park in Lincolnshire.
BGC was launched in 1987 with the opening of Woodthorpe Garden Centre by brothers Charles and Robert Stubbs. Since 2018, it has expanded rapidly with the acquisition of 50 garden centres, allowing it to grow from its heartland to the business it is now, with 73 garden centres spread from Carmarthen to Ramsgate, Wimborne to East Durham.

The group has a team of 3000 colleagues working across the garden centres, restaurants, growing nurseries, distribution centres, Woodthorpe Leisure Park, and Woody’s Restaurant & Bar.