WHETHER you lovingly cultivate a tiny back garden plot or a few rolling acres, there is one event you won't want to miss this week.

The RHS Flower Show at Tatton Park boasts award-winning show gardens, marquees full of prize-winning blooms and just about every conceivable garden-ing-related item on sale.

With hot weather predicted, several designers have taken inspiration from other continents.

Louise Ward and Lucy Hunter are creating 'Out of Africa', an art deco show-garden inspired by the film, while Tatton Park's very own back-to-back garden 'Into Africa -Lord Egerton's Legacy', will resemble a Kenyan school garden, with Masai shields and spears.

Probably the only person on site who will be hoping for some rain during the show will be Andrew Parsons, whose Rainy City Garden is designed as a back-to-back space for the wet Manchester weather.

His moisture-loving planting will be craving a rain shower, and without it his unique 'rain chime' accessory will not make a sound.

Eating healthily will be showcased in Jacqui Brocklehurt's 'Eat My Garden' back-to-back, showing how a grow-your-own garden can have an attractive design with sweetcorn, chillies and edible flowers like marigolds.

The Northwest Regional Development Agency's show garden will have 'five-a-day' on the menu with a design that will eventually become the garden for two merging inner city schools in Salford. A greenhouse and terraces of fruit and vegetables will be grown in an 'outdoor classroom', teaching youngsters about healthy eating and the environment.

The show opens for RHS members today and for the general public from Thursday until Sunday. Opening times each day are 10am until 7pm and 5pm on Sunday after the famous flower and produce sale at 4pm.

Call 0870 906 3311 (public) or 0870 906 3810 (RHS members).