'I'm Monty Don's protege and will never forget King Charles' four-word warning to me'

Monty Don’s protégé has said they will never forget the four-word warning they were given by King Charles soon after they were introduced.

Jamie Butterworth, 30, has become a star of the gardening world in recent years. He won gold for his RHS Chelsea Flower Showgarden in 2022 before creating a feature garden at the RHS Hampton Court Flower Show in 2024.

More recently, he grew 10,000 plants for the Gucci Cruise 2025 show and helped create a rose garden at this year’s Ascot. As a result, he has caught the eye, not just of gardening royalty, but actual royalty too.

Dubbed ‘Monty Don’s protégé’, Jamie has spoken about the time he was introduced to King Charles by presenter Jo Whiley at the Chelsea Flower Show. Jamie already had a relationship with the Royal Family, as his nursery supplies plants to Windsor Castle, but he had never been introduced to his client.

Speaking to the Times about the moment, Jamie says he was surprised to find out that the King, a keen gardener himself, knew him by name.

He said: “Jo introduced me as I was standing next to Monty, and the King said, ‘I know Jamie — you are delivering plants to me on Wednesday. Please don’t be late.’”

In fact, it is the King’s love of gardeningand appreciation for the environment as a whole that has given Jamie an appreciation for how equalising gardening is.

He explained: “I think that’s one of the wonderful things about gardening. It’s the greatest leveller –– it unifies people. It doesn’t matter who you are, where you’re from, what your background is — anyone can garden.”

Jamie’s renown within the gardening world has sense led him to appear on Gardeners’ World several times since April last year, appearing on the same show as legendary co-host Monty who he revealed has been giving him some pieces of advice to help him along the way.

Meanwhile, has Jamie looks ahead to potentially taking up Monty’s mantel, there has been growing speculation as to when that would be. Speaking to The Garden Magazine, Monty spoke about winding down some of his activities for the rest of year.

The 70-year-old said: "In April I started filming a new travel series going from the source of the Rhine to the sea visiting gardens in Italy, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Germany, Holland and France.

I've got a couple of gardens that I'm working on for charity and have more talks to do. That will take me through until November. I've decided I won't do any more tours after that.”

Despite this, Monty has suggested in the past he would not leave Gardeners’ World until he absolutely had to.

Ahead of his 69th birthday he said: “I'm now 68, I was going to stop when I was 65. I'll now go on till I'm 70 and then reconsider.

“The reason for that is it's not so much wanting my garden back, although there's a strong element of that... It's just that, whilst I've still got energy, there are lots of other projects I want to do that mean I can't be here every week."