Yorkshire Forward has paid £100,000 for a traditional Tyke garden at the Chelsea Flower Show - created by a gardener from Gloucester.

Today the regeneration agency was criticised for giving the contract to Gloucestershire landscape and garden designer Julian Dowle rather than using talent from Bradford or the rest of Yorkshire.

The nine-times Chelsea gold medal winner has created a garden with 29 trees, 200 woodland ferns, 14 climbers and 700 cottage plants and roses, to be unveiled this weekend.

It has 26 yards of Yorkshire paving flagstones, while five lorry loads of stone and roofing tiles have gone into building the beck and barn.

Yorkshire Forward said the garden is part of its ongoing initiative to highlight and promote the region as Britain's best short-break destination.

Mr Dowle said: "The garden recreates the sights, sounds and smells of one of the jewels in Yorkshire's crown - the Yorkshire Dales.

"There is a lot of emphasis on landscaping and using trees and wild flowers native to Yorkshire, together with a stunning garden of cottage plants."

Councillor Anne Hawkesworth, Bradford Council's executive member for the environment, said: "I accept the fact that at times you have to speculate to accumulate. We must do all we can to encourage tourists to Yorkshire."

But she said the commission should have gone to Bradford's talented gardeners.

"It is a lot of money and it is a shame Bradford parks department wasn't given the opportunity to take this up.

"We could have done a splendid job and might have made some profit to help the district. It would have been nice to have been involved in some way."

Councillor Ann Ozolins, deputy leader of the Liberal Democrat group, said: "I think it is very good to advertise Yorkshire in this way but I wish they could have put some money into Bradford as well. It is an extraordinary amount of money for a garden."

The garden is set in the limestone country of the Yorkshire Dales, at the edge of a village. The landscape has a spring, a waterfall filling the beck and a Dales cottage sitting just above. It includes a symbolic garden of Yorkshire roses, and Yorkshire craftsmen have built the dry stone walls.

A Yorkshire Forward spokesman said: "We did speak to local garden designers but Mr Dowle had an outstanding track record."

She said it was also necessary to have past experience of working in the show.