Advocates of beautiful lawns have infiltrated the Chelsea Flower Show to hand out their own awards for perfect turf.

The Lawn Society has been assessing the quality of the turf at the show and concluded that the lawn on a sculpture stand outshone that of each of the professional garden designers.

Brian Alabaster, whose naturalistic sculptures sell for up to £20,000, was judged to have the best lawn in the show and was given its “gold award”.

The “silver-gilt award” was given to the Fortnum & Mason garden, designed by Robert Myers, while “silver” went to Illusionesques and “bronze” to Notcutts.

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Mike Seaton, of the Lawn Society, decided to judge the turf because he felt that it was ignored at Chelsea. Lawns are very much the poor relation at the show, where flowers, trees and wild grasses are preferred.

The lawn market is worth £400 million each year in Britain yet few designers make lawns a central feature of exhibits at the show, which is run by the Royal Horticultural Society.

Mr Seaton said that there should be more recognition of the role and beauty of a carefully cultivated lawn. “There’s nothing like the British lawn,” he said. “I think there are a lot of secret lawn lovers, people who try really hard with their lawns. The RHS is great on flowers at the show, but awful on grass and it’s about time that good lawns were given their due.”

He called for the RHS to give lawns greater prominance at and to create a judging classification devoted to turf.

Mr Seaton, a fellow of the Institute of Groundsmanship and founder of the Lawn Society, said that the unofficial awards were made according to the “quality of the sward” and the suitability of the grass within the design.

Bob Sweet, the show organiser, welcomed the enthusiasm for turf and said that a competition for lawns could be considered in the future. He pointed out that where show gardens included lawns, the quality of the turf was a key factor in the judging.

He said: “To be able to lay good turf for a show is notoriously difficult. I’m delighted that the gardens and exhibits at the show are being looked at more closely by a specialist. We have a team of advisers here to answer the public’s questions about gardening issues and lawns always get the highest number of queries and inquiries.”

Mr Alabaster was delighted that his stand had been judged the best for turf by the Lawn Society, which was set up to provide independent advice on lawn care.

“There is something special about a beautifully manicured lawn,” he said. “It’s very English, it’s evocative of English gardens, especially the smell of freshly mown grass.

“A lot of thought goes into the stand and we wanted a neutral background to show our sculptures. In the past we’ve used hundreds of flowers but they distracted the visitors. The turf is a lovely clean background.”

Mr Myers, who designed the Fortnum & Mason bee garden, said: “The lawn is a very important part of the garden. It gives it a soft edge to the planting.”

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