ST SAVIOUR were crowned Battle of Flowers champions yesterday for the first time in the event’s 107 years.

The parish’s stunning float, Hanamachi, was based on a Japanese garden, complete with gravel beds, orchids and pergolas.

Their Battle chairman, Don Hughes , said that the team members were ‘over the moon’, adding: ‘We didn’t expect to win the Prix d’Honneur. We hoped we might win something, but this is an amazing feeling. Everyone in the team was delighted when they found out.’

However, it wasn’t just the winners who walked away from the day’s events on a high. Financial worries that could have forced next year’s Battle of Flowers to be cancelled were swept aside before yesterday’s parade when the current lead sponsors agreed to fund the event for a third year in succession.

The chairman of CPA Global, Geoffrey Grimes, took the event organisers by surprise at the VIP lunch when he announced that the company would again be putting £25,000 into the Battle next year.

The parade’s finance director, Kevin Keen, was delighted when the announcement was made. ‘It’s better than Christmas,’ he said. ‘It’s fantastic news. I had no idea whatsoever. It’s incredibly good news. It’s just brilliant.’

The sun may not have shone too brightly on yesterday’s event, but the rain did manage to hold off for most of the parade – although Miss Battle, Lucy O’Sullivan, and Mr Battle, celebrity chef Marco Pierre White, were seen sheltering under an umbrella when their float broke down at one point in the afternoon.

• Words: Anthony Dearie

• Pictures: Rob Currie, Tony Pike and Richard Wainwright

• Full reports, results and pictures in today’s Jersey Evening Post special Battle souvenir supplement.

• Picture sales: Click here