THE weekend’s sunshine brought huge crowds flocking to the annual two-day Malvern Autumn Show at the Three Counties Showground.

This year marked the event’s 20th birthday and on display was the seasonal extravaganza of giant vegetables, numerous succulent fruits and the best of the harvest with the show’s organisers anticipating the crowd to be around the 60,000 mark.

Not only were visitors able enjoy a celebration of the best seasonal food and gardening, there were plenty of other attractions to satisfy all interests.

These included a variety of cookery demonstrations - where many of the well known chefs were using locally sourced produce, and there was also the opportunity to see floral demonstrations, a variety of animals in action, along with the chance to walk round a vintage village and a huge allotment, and also enjoy craft and art areas.

Among the celebrity chefs cooking up tempting dishes was Valentine Warner along with Liz Knight, Daren Bale and Felice Tocchini.

The show once again hosted an RHS Flower Show and the UK National Giant Vegetables Championships Fuchsia Friends, a Bromsgrove-based organisation dedicated to promoting the plant, was celebrating after gaining a Silver Gilt award.

Treasurer Nancy Phillips, whose husband Arthur in president of the National Fuchsia Society, said they were delighted to win the award, especially as they are only a small group of enthusiasts dedicated to spreading their love of the fuchsia.

“There’s only 10 of us in the Friends group and everything that is on display has been grown by our members.

“Basically we set ourselves up simply to grow fuchsias and to spread our enthusiasm, and hopefully get other people interested by going out throughout the year to various groups and organisations to speak about and display what we have grown.”

It’s the second time Fuchsia Friends has won a Silver Gilt in the 15 years it has been in existence and during that time they have also gained two silvers at the show, so obviously their target is now gold.

Their display at the Autumn Show featured more than 50 varieties of fuchsia.

American-born Mrs Phillips, who hails from Seattle, said: “Over the years we have brought over a number of varieties from the States including some rarer ones such as White Linen, which came from Oregon - an area not that far from Seattle.”

Also on show was a Seattle Blue.