Sales have doubled in the last year alone and now with the new film Gnomeo and Juliet introducing a new generation of children to the concept of the little garden friends, who knows where this sales boom will lead. Maybe they will pep from the flowerbeds of every garden, as they did in Victorian times.

The cheeky little chappies have been unpopular in recent years, with snobbery and stricter rules in garden, horticulture and flower shows being blamed for their fall from grace. Seen as tacky and distracting, gnomes have suffered a fall in sales over the past few decades.
The RHS Chelsea Flower show controversially banned gnomes from its gardens, saying they were not legitimately horticultural. Critics claim that it is because organisers associated gnomes with working class or lower income gardens.

There are reportedly 25 million gnomes currently inhabiting gardens in Germany, and it is in Gräfenroda, in Thuringia, Germany, where the first ceramic garden ornaments were made by Phillip Griebel. The gnomes were based upon a myth that they would eagerly help out in the garden at night. From the eighteenth century other companies started producing their own versions, and gradually garden gnomes spread all over the globe. Most German producers went out of business during world war II and now there are only the original Griebel descendents, with other manufacturers being located in Poland or China.

In 1847 Sir Charles Isham introduced garden gnomes to England when he brought twenty one gnomes back from Germany for use in his garden at Lamport hall, in Northamptonshire. Lampy is well into his hundreds and enjoys a place on display now in the hall itself where he is insured for around a million pounds.

The Garden Gnome Liberation Front or “Front de Liberation des Nains de Jardins” are both popular groups, with members stealing ill kept gnomes or gnomes in smaller gardens, and freeing them to national parks or gnome sanctuaries!

Many gnomes are the victims of gnoming, otherwise known as theft. This has become a more common crime, with the prank of taking a gnome on holiday and returning it with tourist photographs featuring in many T.V. shows and films. This led to the travel agent Travelocity running an advertising campaign featuring their own gnome in various locations.

Most gnomes nowadays are plastic, resin or pot, (made with runny clay poured into a mould, allowed to set a little, then poured out to leave a hollow interior). They come in all colours and designs and are fitted with different functions, such as motion-detecting whistling or nodding heads or flashing lights. Many feature an inbuilt garden lamp. Gnomes can be a perfect addition to any garden, and are a gardener’s best friend.

What are your thoughts on garden gnomes?