Just over 25 years ago journalist Beth Williams, nee Mullins, was reporting on the closure of Kent’s last working coal mine, the Betteshanger Colliery.

A quarter of a century on and the journalist-turned-garden designer, who lives in Hastingleigh, near Wye, joined fellow Hadlow College graduate Stuart Charles Towner to build a show garden at Royal Horticultural Society’s (RHS) Hampton Court Palace Flower Show to celebrate east Kent’s mining history.

The architecturally strong garden, complete with miner’s lift, walls made from Kent shale and planting to echo how nature recolonises, was deemed so exceptional judges named it Best Show Garden and gave it the coveted RHS gold medal.

The Green Seam garden tells a poignant story of the pit’s closure, its wilderness years and how the community is looking to the future as Hadlow College embarks on a multi-million pound project to create a sustainable education and business park on the site.

Former miners who assisted Beth and Stuart with their design were at RHS Hampton Court on Monday and Garry Cox, who now lives in Deal, was moved to tears by the garden.

He said: “Hadlow College is our new dawn. Mention miners and people only remember bad times, pickets and fighting with the police – we were much more than that. Now we can look to the future and our communities will survive.

“We have been waiting a long time for an organisation like Hadlow College to come along. This garden is not just for Kent miners but for miners all over the country. I can’t stop the tears.”

Beth, 46, who grew up in Whitstable and works part-time at Ripple Farm Organics in Crundale, near Ashford, said she felt under huge pressure to create a fitting tribute to the miners.

She said: “It was a huge responsibility to get this garden right. I witnessed the demise of the mining community so it has been fantastic to see the miners’ response to the garden. Today has been very emotional.”

Stuart, who won a silver-gilt medal at RHS Hampton Court last year, said: “Beth and I have shared every part of the work on this garden and we are thrilled about what we have achieved. We wanted to represent the real people, the miners, so the past is not forgotten.

“I come from Hampshire but have fallen in love with Kent, I love the place.”

The Green Seam garden will be taken down after the show and recreated at Betteshanger Sustainable Park.

Work on the park starts next month led by Hadlow College’s group director of finance, Mark Lumsdon-Taylor.

He said: “This garden is an important acknowledgement to the history of mining in east Kent and a fitting start to Betteshanger Sustainable Park.

“The regeneration starts now with the first £40m phase creating an environmental and sustainable park for education, heritage, green environmental technology and sustainable business, which will create more than 1,000 jobs over the next four years.

“Hadlow is first and foremost an educational group – very few colleges are putting investment into communities in areas of deprivation and we are very proud of this opportunity.

“We will rebuild a fitting representation to celebrate old and new at Betteshanger because none of this would have happened without the grit and determination of the miners.”