A Collector Lord’s Garden: exploring Thenford Arboretum and Gardens

The sun came out as we entered the Walled Garden. We’d been assailed by horizontal rain as we got out of the car which persisted for the first part of the visit but in this expansive space, clear blue skies and almost warm sunshine prevailed. Where is this paradise when just walking through its gates triggers a meteorological miracle? It’s just one of many beautifully realised areas within Thenford Gardens, on the south-western border of Northamptonshire with Oxfordshire, where over the last forty years Tory ex-minister Michael Heseltine and his wife Anne have created a garden and arboretum around a handsome C18 house.

The Walled Garden, like everything else at Thenford, is on a grand scale. But before we arrive there, let me share with you my impressions of the gardens outside its elegantly curved-corner walls. We visited on 20 February, one of Thenford’s 18 open afternoons each year, attracted by the promise of snowdrops. Lord Heseltine holds one of the seven national collections of snowdrops listed in Plant Heritage’s 2026 directory. There are currently 670 cultivars held in his collection, many planted in generous drifts throughout the garden, some in smaller clumps at the base of trees. With such riches at one’s feet and rising far above you in the form of the collections of rare tree species, it takes a while to walk a few metres without being distracted by some novel specimen.

I do just need to veer off an a slight tangent here. At this point in the visit it struck me as not without irony that earlier that week I’d started to read Andrew Timothy O’Brien’s book To Stand & Stare with its message of ‘a more low-intervention way to garden’. Because here I was face to face with the first of several man-made features in Thenford, The Mount. What O’Brien would describe as a ‘construction of human artifice’ if ever there was, this is a grassy mound around the slopes of which a serpentine path edged with clipped box winds to a summit where sits a Cambodian guardian lion. From this vantage point he surveys a long lawn margined by multi-stemmed Amelanchiers which must look glorious when in flower in spring. Thanks to another visitor, we learned that the delicate snowdrops with yellow ovaries atop their petals, visible at eye-level from the path, were Galanthus ‘Primrose Warburg’.

Though tempted to walk straight towards the Sculpture Garden, I could see on the map that there were treasures to be found parallel with this lawned area. Firstly the Trough Garden! And we’re not talking here of shallow rough-cast containers measuring a couple of feet long and a foot across planted with tiny alpines, but a collection of about forty stone troughs which would once have been used to contain water for cattle and sheep. Many of these are planted with wisterias and dwarf conifers. A wrought iron Coalbrookdale bench painted what I now think of as Clough Williams Ellis* turquoise stands in the centre of the space. The wrought iron theme continues in the form of two exquisite gates decorated with stylised magnolia flowers and the entwined initials M and A to commemorate the Heseltines’ golden wedding anniversary. Like others at Thenford, the gates are made by North Somerset based master blacksmith, Jim Horrobin.

Resisting the urge at this stage to explore the nearby Rill which I’d read about on the Thenford website and knew was going to be spectacular, I entered the Sculpture Garden. Circular knot gardens act as fullstops at each end of a long rectangular space divided into ‘rooms’ by hedges of yew and beech, each room housing a single large sculpture or a couple of smaller pieces. The nearest circular garden is fully evergreen, with topiarised hollies and stone cupids decorating immaculately clipped box compartments. My first impression of the raspberry coloured paintwork of the metal ‘gloriette’ at the centre of the space was unfavourable, but reviewing the photographs now I can see that the slightly bluish pink works very well in contrast with the shades of green elsewhere.

As well as snowdrops and trees, the Heseltines collect contemporary sculpture. And here it is displayed to full advantage, with plenty of empty space around each piece. A standing man by Elizabeth Frink in one space, a trio of gymnasts in another. The head of Lenin you encounter in the final room is a big surprise, both because of its huge scale and the politics of the man who placed it there! Having once dominated a public square in Latvia, it was decommissioned after the fall of communism in 1989.

The other fullstop, called the Circle Garden, is centred with a marble fountain. More box compartments surround it, into which are placed terracotta urns containing more specimens from the snowdrop collection planted into black ‘grass’ Ophiopogon planiscapus ‘Nigrescens’. Here I admired the long petals and distinct green markings of Galanthus James Backhouse.

Though empty of water at this time of year, the Rill is a magnificent sight. I’ve already mentioned the grand scale of the garden features at Thenford and this chain of rectangular pools linked by narrower channels, is very impressive. The tall yew cones standing guard on either side of the rill add to the drama of the scene.

The formal symmetry of the Rill gives way to a series of tree lined pools flowing into one another. A duckhouse floats across one, prevented from crashing into the banks by a rope tethered to the pool bed. To the left of the path skirting the eastern bank of the second pool the roots of a huge ash tree thought to be 200 to 300 years old extend across the grass, resembling moss-encrusted feet. Several clumps of snowdrops nestle between its bony toes.

Not far away an espaliered Magnolia grandiflora emphasises a curved outer corner of the Walled Garden. The walled garden is a two acre rectangle, an open expanse with height supplied by wooden obelisks, a series of domed pavilions and tall beech hedging. Along the northern wall a pretty brick cottage stands between a long range of greenhouses. I read later that this house had been built in 1926 and had been something of whitewashed eyesore with metal windows until transformed into a ‘cottage ornée‘ during the restoration of the Walled Garden. This is where the head gardener lives.

The treeless expanse is cut into quadrants with a square hedged area at its centre. This aerial view from the beautiful coffee table format book about Thenford by Michael and Anne Heseltine shows the layout of the Walled Garden.

The architect Quinlan Terry**, favoured architect of King Charles III, advised on the width and positioning of the main paths. Landscape architect George Carter designed the rest of the space. The four quarters comprise a fruit cage, a sitting area, a herb garden and an aviary. The centre houses a large modern fountain called Coanda, its name deriving from a Romanian professor of hydraulics, Henri Coanda, an authority on the phenomenon of fluids clinging to surfaces. Uniformity between the disparate sections of the garden is achieved by the placement of arched pavilions at the intersection of smaller paths. Some of these are solid sided, some open ironwork structures supporting climbing plants, and those in the aviary faced with glass or perspex, but all topped with a copper dome.

Whether curved corners in a walled garden are unusual I cannot say, but of the three inward facing curves which examined, each is memorable for different reasons. I saw a chaffinch fly out of a nest built into the space between the branches of a fig tree trained against the curve in one. In another a bronze head of Neptune surveys the scene, and in another choice specimens from the National Collection of Galanthus are arranged on shelves in the proscenium of a lead-roofed ‘theatre’ used at other times of the year to display Auricula primroses.

Two acres is a large area and the enticing paths ensure that you are constantly walking onwards to explore as much as possible of this stylish and tranquil enclosed space. It’s such a contrast to the predominantly woodland atmosphere of much of Thenford. The precision of the clipped hedges and topiarised shapes in the Walled Garden as well as elsewhere is exemplary, testament to the skills and dedication of the garden team under the leadership of head gardener Darren Webster. Although I’m not a fan of seeing caged birds, the collection of cockatiels and parakeets do have a very spacious aviary. Many of the garden sculptures throughout Thenford come in pairs, not least a pair of proud hounds either side of one of the gates to the Walled Garden.

I enjoyed seeing the motto carved into a piece of slate above another gate which I recognised from a maple leaf shaped plaque a friend bought me a few years ago. Had Cicero added friends, a cat and chocolate he would have just about nailed the recipe for a contented life.

Double herbaceous borders run the length of the southern boundary of the Walled Garden. The borders are divided into sections by curved box buttresses each adorned with a standard yew ball. The border facing south is backed by the redbrick of the Walled Garden and that facing north by beech hedging interrupted by ‘moon gates’ being trained into the hedge around ironwork supports, through which the farmland beyond the boundary of the garden can be seen. Reviewing my photographs from the visit I am puzzled by the 6 regular chem-trail lines in the top-left of the image, distinctly manmade in contrast to the wispy cloud formations. A distant Red Arrows training flight? Whatever it is it sums up the opposing forces I felt throughout Thenford, where in parts of the garden unruly nature is tamed into rigid yet elegant lines.

The ironmongery on a gate located at the western end of the ‘Allée’ between the borders exemplifies the quality of the workmanship at Thenford, the clasp a work of art in itself. At its eastern end grows a ‘castle’ constructed from monumental ‘blocks’ of yew, from the central arch of which I photographed the borders.

View of the Allée and herbaceous borders from the yew castle

The circuit of the garden continues south alongside the Water Gardens. A trio of ducks stand on the bank of the south flowing stream, on the opposite bank a stag surveys his domain from the edge of a stand of conifers.

At this point in our walk we became aware that the three hours of our open afternoon were ebbing away and we were keen to see the area around the house itself not to mention having a warm drink, the weather having closed in again. Had there been more time we might have walked around the lake and explored three mediaeval fish ponds, Japanese bridges and St Mary’s Church. Instead we proceeded along ‘Lanning’s Walk’, named for Lanning Roper the American garden designer whose advice the Heseltines had sought early in their stewardship of Thenford. A very life-like bronze raven stands atop a wall overlooking the Rose Garden. The avian theme continues near the southern elevation of the house, where a graceful pair of cormorants roost on the edge of the ha-ha which separates a wide crescent of the south lawn from the lower sward sweeping towards the main lake. High yew hedging has been shaped into a distinctive toast rack formation at the ends of the curving ha-ha. On the terrace close to the house a bird table generously hung with feeders is testament to the owners’ love of birdlife.

In a portrait hung in the tea room, Lord Heseltine wearing wellingtons and standing in a large greenhouse, waters plant-laden benches. Lady Heseltine looks on and a Westie stretches beneath a bench. Stylised vignettes of the gardens adorn the outer edges of the painting. While we relaxed with a hot drink before the drive home, the man himself, now 92, drew up to the tea room in a golf buggy to greet visitors and chat.

Michael Heseltine. Photo by Eric Farnworth.

As we headed towards the carpark I recognised Darren Webster from his photograph in the Thenford book. Two of us in our party of four on this visit had worked at Kew Gardens: Charlotte as a Visitor Services team leader and I in the Visitor Information team. While Darren’s years as a Kew Diploma student pre-dated our time at Kew, he was more than happy to chat about Kew and reminisce about his contemporaries there, many of whom are now senior members of the horticulture team. He qualified from Kew immediately into working at Thenford and has been there since 1996. He clearly relishes his role at Thenford and explained that he is supported by the equivalent of ten full-time gardeners and three volunteers. Nodding towards where his employer was standing, he acknowledged the advantage of working where the owners take such an active interest in the development of the garden.

Leaving Thenford, the late February sun bathed the Main Gate. An invitation to return? As we drove home, we agreed that we had just visited a very special garden which was more than worth seeing in another season.

Kew, 8 March 2026

*This is the colour of all the ironwork in Plas Brondanw the North Wales garden made by architect Clough Williams-Ellis a few miles from his Italianate village of Portmeirion. I was there in June 2025 and it, along with several other gardens I went to on the same trip, deserve a blog of their own.

**Researching this blog I was surprised to read that as well as the Richmond Riverside development which I walked past this very afternoon, Quinlan Terry redesigned Brentwood Cathedral, a mile from where I grew up and scene of my first holy communion. His redevelopment in classical Palladian style, supplanted the almost modernist space that in turn had replaced the sombre interior that I remember from my Sixties childhood.

Here’s a selection of some of the other photographs I took at Thenford. Ironically, having imagined that the main attraction in February would be the vast collection of snowdrops, which was truly impressive, I confess to having been somewhat distracted by the extent and impact of the garden ‘architecture’. But to see great swathes of some unusual cultivars naturalised amongst the tree collection was a huge pleasure. Three hours was barely long enough to do justice to the place. We were given an A3 map of the gardens on arrival, printed on high quality paper, which illustrates the scale of Thenford.

Shortcuts to Idents

In our busy lives, with so much information being flung at us all the time, anything that helps us to remember useful facts without immediately resorting to Dr Google is valuable. For example, Every Good Boy Deserves Favour spells out the five lines of the treble clef. And I have a friend who can recite the whole of the rhyme reciting the royal monarchs starting Willy, Willy, Harry, Ste,
Harry, Dick, John, Harry three,
One, two, three Neds, Richard two….

The botanical world is not immune from mnemonics of this kind. Ed, a volunteer colleague at NT Osterley House and Garden, recently taught me this rhyme:

Sedges have edges, rushes are round, grasses have knees that bend to the ground.

Sure enough, sedges have triangular stems and a mature grass stem is jointed with a series of nodes along its length.

During our Friday volunteer stints we chat a great deal about plants and try our best to name what we’re weeding out or trimming back. Coincidentally on the same day that I learnt the rhyme, Jasper, assistant gardener, showed us a quick method of identifying a couple of shrubs and trees when they are not in flower. He demonstrated that dogwoods (Cornus) have ‘elasticated’ leaves. If you tear the leaf in half across the way, you can gently stretch the central rib so that the two halves of the leaf remain connected by the stretched rib. And he pointed out that cherry leaves have nectaries at the place where the leaf stalk joins the branch. Sure enough, when I got home I checked my Snow Goose cherry tree and there they were: little nodes at the base of every leaf. Intrigued as to their purpose, I found this theory on the website of the Oxford University Herbarium:

At the base of the blade of a cherry leaf there are two extrafloral nectaries, which are thought to protect the plant’s leaves from damage by herbivorous insects. The nectaries attract ants by producing small quantities of sugar-rich nectar, which appears to encourage additional patrolling by ants. If the ants encounter any caterpillars they aggressively defend the leaf, even carrying the offending animal back to their nests.

I can’t help considering the irony of the caterpillars I’m so keen to attract to the garden being prey to marauding ants. No ant activity on the tree to report to date!

Whilst writing the notes for a recent talk I gave about planting wildflowers in the garden to attract butterflies and moths, the mint family came up several times. I was reminded that a shortcut to identifying members of this large plant family, which are also called the dead-nettles (Lamiaceae), is that they have square stems. Just a light touch of the thumb and forefinger around the stem reveals the stem’s angled sides. By the way, red dead-nettle, water mint, betony and selfheal are all well-behaved wildflowers to introduce into the garden. The first two are caterpillar food plants for several species of moth, and the flowers of the last two are rich in nectar for butterflies and other pollinators.

Another gardening friend of mine distinguishes beech and hornbeam by noting that hornbeam leaves have toothed edges and beech leaves have wavy edges. When I visited Kathy Brown’s Stevington Manor Garden near Bedford yesterday, I asked Kathy if she had any quick routes to plant identification. She opened up a whole new dimension to the topic by introducing the element of light: how it plays upon a leaf or indeed the whole plant. For example, hornbeam leaves are matte and beech leaves shiny. And pointing towards tall grasses in a nearby border she showed me that light reflects off the graceful Miscanthus making it shimmer, whilst the nearby Calamagrostis overdam absorbs the sunlight and appears more solid and blocky.

I referred to the mint family earlier, one member of which is lavender. I can’t mention to the visit to Kathy Brown’s Garden without praising her fabulous edible flower cakes, not least the lavender and lemon drizzle cake. The lavender is harvested from the borders in front of the topiary jury scene in the Formal Garden. The 4.5 acre garden beside the meadows of the Great Ouse is a joy, with ‘rooms’ inspired not only by historic gardens but also great works of art. The ‘Art Gardens’ include two purple beech and Berberis lined chambers evoking Mark Rothko’s Seagram Murals. With not a drop of water in sight, Kathy and her husband Simon have recreated Claude Monet’s Water Lilies using grasses, Echinacea and Geranium Rozanne to emulate the muted shades of gold, white and violet in the paintings. There is great deal more to this garden than this and I strongly recommend a visit there this summer: details of opening times are on the website, linked above.

*Kathy Brown leading the tour with Jessica in tow*

*Looking from the fountain towards the gazebo*

Do you have quick, non-digital ways to identify plants? I’d love to hear about them. As I write this it’s 28°C in the shade, so I shall sign off for now and retreat to a cool spot to ponder the endless variations in form, texture, colour we find in plants.

Kew Gardens, 11 July 2025

Rousham: Arcadia in Oxfordshire

In 2021, when we were still in recovery from the pandemic and growing accustomed to both socialising and learning online, I undertook a course with Oxford Continuing Education on the subject of English Landscape Gardens 1650 to the present day. We were tasked with writing two assignments, the shorter of which was an account of an C18 landscape garden. I chose a garden in Oxfordshire which many people had recommended to me as unlike anything I would have seen anywhere else. The garden was Rousham, near Bicester, which I visited a few days after my birthday in early September 2017. The garden is indeed unique, not least for banning children under 15 and dogs!

In his recent British Gardens series for the BBC, Monty Don included Rousham in his seemingly helter skelter tour of gardens across England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. He clearly holds it in great affection and highlighted many of the same features which I highlighted in my essay, which follows.

Begun by Charles Bridgeman in the 1720s for Colonel Robert Dormer, the landscape at Rousham was further developed by William Kent for his brother General James Dormer (along with the house itself) from 1737. Kent retained much of Bridgeman’s layout such as the bowling green and riverside terrace, but he softened the outlines of the amphitheatre and transformed a series of descending formal pools into a cascade, the Vale of Venus.

Figure 2 Woodland edge, Rousham. 2 Sept 2017

Solitary classical statues (Apollo, Pan, Bacchus, Ceres, Mercury) at the edges of woodland beckon the visitor to the next episode in the garden, helping to create a mysterious atmosphere of a mythical realm at one remove from the world outside.

Well-lit lawns give way to shaded groves, the progression from light through shade to light again lending an air of drama to the landscape. A channelled rill snakes through the garden to the cascade, its route interrupted by a hexagonal plunge pool.

Kent borrowed neighbouring landscape by installing an eye-catcher on a hill visible from the bowling green at the rear of the house, emphasising the attractive view of the countryside beyond the estate. This feature consists of three arches in Gothick style. He continued this theme for Cuttle Mill, a building in the middle distance, which he fitted with a Gothick gable end.

Along a ridge overlooking the curve of the River Cherwell, stands a seven-arched arcade containing a shaded walkway, the Praeneste. General Dormer installed statue busts of his Roman heroes in the Praeneste, the only hint of a political message in this otherwise escapist garden. Many Whigs opposed to Sir Robert Walpole, prime minister from 1721 to 1742, installed pantheons or obelisks honouring classical heroes in their gardens, to contrast these ideal leadership figures with the, in their opinion, less than satisfactory current regime.

Nowhere in Kent’s Rousham is there a trace of the parterres which featured so strongly in the Baroque gardens of the previous century. Nor the serpentine walks through woodland which developed as the seventeenth century wore on. At Rousham there is no defined ‘landscape circuit’ as described by Uglow[1]. Most of the episodes in the garden can be entered and exited via different routes.

Like the early Hanoverian gardens of the first decades of the Eighteenth century, Rousham has elements of the naturalistic landscape design in vogue at that time. But what distinguishes it from those gardens is the dramatic flair introduced by William Kent who had first experimented with re-creating a classical landscape in his work for Lord Burlington at Chiswick House. At Rousham he succeeded in developing the conceit that when in residence the gentleman landowner is pursuing a rural idyll of the kind advocated by Virgil and Horace.

Within thirty years of its creation, the landscape at Rousham attracted the approval of Sir Horace Walpole, who described it in a letter to George Montagu as having

the sweetest little groves, streams, glades, porticoes, cascades, and river, imaginable; all the scenes are perfectly classic.[2]

We are fortunate that the early Eighteenth century garden at Rousham survives intact, as an example of Kent’s unique ability, described by Richardson, to combine designing ‘architectural caprices’ with ‘moulding physical space’. [3]

Footnotes

[1] Uglow J. (2004) A Little History of British Gardening p.131

[2] Wikipedia entry on Rousham. Letter from Walpole to George Montagu 19 July 1760

[3] Richardson T. (2007) The Arcadian Friends p.290

Bibliography

National Heritage List for England [Online] available at https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1000107, (Accessed 21 March 2021)

Richardson T. (2007) The Arcadian Friends, Bantam Press, London.

Wikipedia entry for Rousham [Online] https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=rousham+wiki&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8, (Accessed 21 March 2021)

Uglow J. (2004) A Little History of British Gardening, Chatto & Windus, London.

Postcript

To one side of the landscaped gardens at Rousham, sits a large walled garden, complete with dovecote. My images of that section of the garden follow.

Kew Gardens, 20 February 2025

A very special trip to Sainsbury’s

Woolbeding Gardens and West Dean Gardens in West Sussex

In this ‘Twixtmas’ period of short dark days with the promise of lengthening days around the corner, it’s a good time to reflect on garden visits this past year. Despite all good intentions, the number of blogs I write by no means reflects the number of gardens I visit. Inevitably some go unrecorded, save for a clutch of digital images, secured on the cloud but destined for obscurity unless I wrangle them into a blog such as that to follow here.

In late April I was on the road to West Sussex with a friend and colleague from Kew days, who is as comprehensive in her exploration of a new garden as am I. Not a plant or design detail goes unheeded or commented upon, meaning that visits take as long as necessary for us to feel we’ve not missed an important feature or tree! That’s not to say we don’t factor coffee, lunch and tea into the itinerary. These form an important part of the day and all the better if available in the garden to be visited.

We ambitiously plotted a course to two gardens near Midhurst, a stay in an Air BnB within a stone’s throw of Chichester Cathedral, and two gardens to the east of Chichester. In this and the next blog I’ll try to do justice to the gardens we explored. The first stop on the tour was the National Trust’s Woolbeding Gardens.

Because there is no parking at Woolbeding, a minibus picks you up in the car park of the Midhurst leisure centre. The jolly driver advised us that we were in good time for the opening of the glasshouse. As veterans of Kew’s visitor services team, and used to tracking the opening times of visitor attractions in the Gardens, we noted this and didn’t ask for further particulars. On having our membership cards scanned on arrival, we were again reminded of the glasshouse opening time and yet again in the cafe where we planned to orient ourselves over a coffee before setting off around the garden. We finally twigged that this wasn’t any old glasshouse, and that something rather special was about to happen. Trying not to be distracted by tempting borders to either side, we walked down to find a small cluster of people looking expectantly at a tall diamond-shaped glasshouse. Murmuring conversations petered away and above the sound of birdsong, we could hear a low mechanical hum whilst ten isosceles triangled panes of glass forming the upper section of the house slowly opened outwards, like the petals of a giant flower responding to the sun’s rays. After the process which took about three minutes in complete silence, it felt as though we’d taken part in some form of special ceremony.

Woolbeding is a curious blend of formal, landscape and contemporary gardens. At its heart is a C17 house which was leased to Simon Sainsbury in 1972, after being given to the National Trust in 1957 by the Lascelles family.

It is difficult to believe that the garden is barely 50 years old, especially the pleasure garden area called the Longwalk alongside the River Rother, which emulates the atmosphere and style of an C18 landscape garden, complete with ruined abbey, hermit’s hut, Chinese bridge, river god and gothic summerhouse. The abbey ruins were so authentic that it came as a shock to find they dated from the late 1990s! When I read the Longwalk was designed by Julian and Isabel Bannerman, I began to recognise their trademark theatricality, as exemplified in the Collector Earl’s garden at Arundel Castle. Yellow skunk cabbage (Lysichiton americanus) and globeflower (Trollius europaeus) were echoed in the colour of the painted Chinese bridge. A gnarly rustic fountain in The Four Seasons garden stands within a flint edged circular pool fed by a deep rill whose banks are planted with ferns and primroses.

We doubled back to designer Lanning Roper’s formal garden rooms, several of which are created around water features. High yew and hornbeam hedging divide the rooms within the old walled garden. The Fountain Garden’s centrepiece is a Renaissance style octagonal fountain surmounted by a figure of Neptune and dolphins. The original C16 Italian statue is on loan to the V&A. Trellised trained fruit trees adorn a brick wall on one side of the Vegetable Garden. The topiary and abundant greenery in that garden give way to an austere symmetry in The Swimming Pool garden.

A striking polished steel sculpture/water feature designed by William Pye dominates the elevation of the house facing the formal garden rooms. Again, this reminded me of a garden elsewhere: the eight water sculptures in the Serpent Garden at Alnwick are the work of Pye. One of these, ‘Coanda’, resembles that at Woolbeding:

THIS SCULPTURE SHOWS THE COANDA EFFECT WHICH MAKES WATER CLING TO THE UNDERSIDE OF SMOOTH OVERHANGING SURFACES, APPEARING TO DEFY GRAVITY. THE COANDA EFFECT WAS DISCOVERED BY HENRI COANDA, A FAMOUS AERONAUTICAL ENGINEER WHO WENT ON TO DEVELOP A FLYING SAUCER. HE STUDIED SCULPTURE WITH RODIN AND ENGINEERING WITH ALEXANDRE EIFFEL.

Extract from the Alnwick Gardens website

Leaving the classical formality of the garden rooms, we crossed an expansive lawn dominated by an eye-catcher, the circular Tulip Folly atop a low mound.

The garden zones of the Silk Route garden emulate the habitats of the ancient trade route from Asia to Europe, taking in the Mediterranean climate of the Istanbul region, the alpine environment of the Anatolian Plateau, followed by Iran represented by old roses and onwards to the Himalayas. Then come plants typical of Central Asia before arriving in the Chinese temperate region. Varying substrates distinguish one zone from the next, with rocks and gravel reflecting the geology of the regions along the route. The planting and landscaping throughout the Silk Route garden appear resilient to climate change: good drainage to cope with heavy downpours and a choice of species that might withstand droughty conditions without additional irrigation. In concluding my current talk to garden clubs on the topic of resilient gardening, I suggest a few gardens to visit where this kind of gardening can be seen in practice. Naturally the Silk Route garden features in my list.

The Silk Route ‘s destination is China’s sub-tropical zone inside the Heatherwick Studio’s glasshouse, designed to resemble an Edwardian terrarium, its glass ‘sepals’ opening and closing to maintain the correct temperature and climatic conditions for plants such as bananas and tender gingers.

April showers somewhat marred the afternoon visit to West Dean Gardens, a garden that I visited frequently when my parents were alive, as it was easily accessible from Petersfield where they lived after retirement. It is beautifully set, with views across the River Rother to sheep-grazed meadows at the foot of the South Downs and the St Roche’s Arboretum beyond.

The imposing flint built mansion is home to the Sussex campus of the West Dean College of Arts, Design, Craft and Conservation. The extensive walled gardens contain many restored Victorian glasshouses as well as a cutting garden area planted with dozens of tulips. I was disappointed to find that the 100m plus long Edwardian pergola was undergoing restoration, but the water gardens welcomed the damp conditions and the woodland planting was as varied as I had remembered. There’s an excellent cafe and shop at West Dean and I confess we retreated there for an hour or so to escape the elements.

We arrived in Chichester in the rain to plan the next day’s garden touring. The apartment block we stayed in was beside the multi-storey where I always parked on trips to Chichester with my parents! The apartment itself overlooked the elegant spire of the cathedral and the Downs in the distance.

Kew, 28 December 2024

In search of Richard Turner

Victorian glasshouse with curved roofs against a blue sky

Curvilinear glasshouses at two Irish botanic gardens and the Palm House at Kew

Engineer and iron founder Richard Turner (1798–1881) built glasshouses in two Irish botanic gardens before collaborating with Decimus Burton in the construction of the Palm House in Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. The first to be built was the Palm House at the Belfast Botanic Gardens completed in 1840. 1848 saw the completion of both the Curvilinear Range at the National Botanic Gardens in Dublin and the Palm House at Kew.

In early October I visited both the Irish gardens and was intrigued to observe how Turner’s glasshouses compared with Kew Gardens’ own Palm House. I had always understood there to be an Irish connection with the distinctive building at Kew that is often preceded by the adjective ‘iconic’, and erroneously thought that Decimus Burton was Irish. But a quick consultation with Wikipedia before my trip revealed that it was Dublin-born Turner who had mastered the art of creating curvilinear glasshouses through the use of wrought iron ribs linked with cast iron tubes. These glazing bars were light enough to support curving glass structures often likened in shape to the upturned hull of a ship.

Having used this innovative technology for a conservatory at a private estate in Fermanagh, Turner was engaged to build the Palm House at the Botanic Gardens, Belfast to a design by Charles Lanyon, and it was completed in 1840. The Curvilinear Range at the National Botanic Gardens of Ireland and the Palm House at Kew followed in 1848. According to historian of Kew, Ray Desmond, the collaborative relationship between Burton and Turner which resulted in Palm House at Kew was not without some tensions and once the glasshouse was completed, Turner’s role was relegated to ‘the subordinate role of a builder who had merely followed his architect’s plans’. This was despite his having devised a way to span 50 feet using the strength of wrought iron, meaning the central area was unimpeded by supporting columns. But Ray Desmond concludes that

an examination of all relevant archives reveals how much Burton was indebted to Turner’s engineering skills and ingenuity. Burton exercised a classical restraint on Turner’s tendency to decorative excess but, thankfully, did not entirely inhibit him. His scrolls and plant forms and the ubiquitous sunflower motif endow the ironwork with vivacity, even frivolity. The puritanical proclivities of Burton were counterpoised by Turner’s instinctive ebullience.

Because I started my Irish sojourn in Dublin, I’m going to take you first to the National Botanic Gardens of Ireland. Turner’s Curvilinear Range of intersecting glasshouses is located a short distance from the visitor centre and it didn’t take long to find some of Turner’s scrolls and plant forms both inside and outside the building. It’s one of two glasshouses open to the public, the other being the Palm House which dates from 1880 and, like the Tropical Ravine at Belfast (see below), is distinguished from its namesake at Kew by having a solid rather than glass rear wall.

The Curvilinear Range

The Palm House

There are many elements to Dublin’s botanic garden which occupies a relatively small area alongside historic Glasnevin Cemetery, and is intersected by the River Tolka, tributary of the Liffey. Those individual areas include a sloping walled garden with lean-to glasshouse and bothy linked by an intricate knot garden of box. Neat vegetable beds occupy the centre of the garden interspersed with handsome terracotta rhubarb forcers and pots stamped with the name Kiltrea of Enniscorthy in County Wexford. I was sad to read on Facebook that the pottery’s kilns are no longer firing and the potter’s wheel has stopped turning here at Kiltrea, the owners having retired.

On this side of the garden, which runs alongside the walls of Glasnevin Cemetery, and indeed includes a gateway into it, glimpses of the cemetery’s round tower appear through the trees. It was fascinating to explore Wild Ireland, where a range of natural areas have been replicated using characteristic soils and plants, including the distinctive limestone pavement of the Burren in County Clare, coastal habitat, various woodland habitats and a wetland area. Some of the 940 species endemic to Ireland are represented, including the strawberry tree, Arbutus unedo, which is such a feature of the woodlands around Killarney in County Kerry. Passing a colourful salvia border, I found the reconstruction of a Viking thatched hut, a reminder of early invaders of the country.

A steel sculpture looked familiar and I realised it resembled the Bootstrapping DNA sculpture outside the Jodrell Laboratory in Kew, the work of Charles Jencks, American landscape designer and architectural historian. The sculpture is called ?What is Life? and was installed to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the discovery of The Double Helix by James Watson and Francis Crick in 1953.

After four days in Dublin, I headed north to Belfast to spend time with friends from northern Virginia, London and Northamptonshire. Naturally the itinerary for this reunion visit had to include Belfast’s Botanic Gardens in the University Quarter. I visited the Botanic Gardens on a dank, drizzly morning, reassured to know that the impressive Ulster Museum is located within the Gardens, offering a cosy retreat should the rain intensify. The curving silhouette and decorative ironwork of the building indicated Richard Turner’s role in its construction. Like Kew’s Palm House it is betraying signs of age. Turner’s Palm House consists of two wings, the cool wing and the tropical wing.

By contrast to the jelly-moulded shape of the Palm House, the facade of the evocatively named Tropical Ravine across the way, looks so solid and Victorian in style that it’s a surprise to find a two storey glasshouse located behind the brickwork. The ground floor is the preserve of the horticultural team and steps lead up to the first floor (with a lift making it accessible for everyone). The perimeter walkway allows you to gaze across and down into both tropical and temperate zones and to appreciate the architectural structure of the plants featured. There’s a corner devoted to ferns, which must have appreciated the moisture generated by the misting system which operated every so often. Every day’s a school day as they say and here I learnt for the first time of John Templeton (1766-1825) known as The Father of Irish Botany.

Before I leave Ireland and return to Kew Gardens, allow me to take you on a detour to the north west of Belfast. Having revelled in the geological phenomenon of the Giant’s Causeway on the Antrim coast we returned to the city via the grounds of Gracehill House to see the avenue of beech trees planted by the Stuart family in the eighteenth century to impress visitors as they approached the entrance to their Georgian mansion. Known as the Dark Hedges, the highest branches of the trees entwine to form a tunnel almost perpendicular in form. The location was used in Game of Thrones in which it was called the King’s Road.

Knowing I was going to write this post this evening, I took several photographs of the inside of the Palm House at Kew yesterday, paying particular attention to Turner’s decorative ironwork. I suppose what strikes you with this extraordinary building is its scale, both in height and length. The building is shortly to undergo a major refurbishment, with the preparation for closure already underway.

Two ‘decant’ glasshouses are being built to house the plants from the Palm House while restoration works take place over the next several years. One is being built near the house itself and the other behind the scenes near the Tropical Nursery site.

My close-up of one of the sunflower motifs shows why the refurbishment project is necessary. Having worked at Kew while the Temperate House project took place, in the visitor information team, I fielded many comments expressing disappointment at the house being closed, and no doubt my successors will experience similar complaints about the Palm House in the months to come. But the years of negativity were forgotten when the building was re-opened in May 2018 to reveal the sparkling glasswork and paintwork of what was described in a song written to celebrate the re-opening as a ‘cathedral of light’. Roll on the day when the same can be said of a refurbished Palm House and the combined genius of Decimus Burton and Richard Turner can be admired once again.

Kew Gardens, 8 November 2024.

Postscript

Richard Turner’s ironworks in Ballsbridge in south Dublin produced not only the materials for the historic glasshouses I’ve written about in this post, but the decorative ironwork for the fanlights which adorn the front doors of the Georgian houses on Dublin’s Leeson Street. When I first started visiting Dublin with my family in the 1960s and 1970s, the tourist board produced a striking poster featuring the Georgian doors of Dublin and I’d like to think that one of them at least might have featured a fanlight made at the Turner ironworks. Here is my tribute to that classic poster.

Lutyens in Dublin

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This morning London was enveloped in dank drizzle but I flew into a Dublin enjoying dazzling sunshine on the first day of October. I dumped my luggage at the hotel and set off to the west of the city to Islandbridge, Dublin 8. My walk took me along the quays on the south side of the River Liffey, with wonderful views across to the Custom House and the Four Courts, not to mention historic bridges like the Halfpenny Bridge footbridge. This was my Dublin born mother’s favourite landmark in the city and I was so happy to see it on a fine autumn afternoon.

The Custom House, the Four Courts and Halfpenny Bridge

Past Guinness’s vast St James’s Gate brewery I walked, then crossed the river and followed the road to the south of Phoenix Park, until I reached my destination, the Irish National War Memorial Gardens. I wasn’t prepared for the scale and grandeur of the place. The Gardens form the centrepiece of a peaceful park beside the river. The appoach is dotted with Lutyens’ distinctive wave-backed benches. Each bench is painted red, which lends the place an almost Japanese garden air, save for a circular domed temple in classical style. In 1929 Sir Edwin Lutyens was commissioned by the Irish Government to design a Garden of Remembrance and a War Memorial. Ironically, the project was completed in 1939 on the eve of WW2. The Gardens are dedicated to Irish soldiers who died during the First World War.

This aerial view of the Gardens conveys the symmetrical design adopted by Lutyens, each ‘wing’ of the design occupied by identical sunken rose gardens and pillared colonnades entwined with vines and wisteria linking granite ‘book rooms’. Sadly locked this afternoon, I’ve read that the rooms house Ireland’s Memorial Records, eight volumes listing the names of Irish soldiers who died in the Great War. From the photographs I’ve seen of these beautifully illuminated books, they are truly beautiful objects. The artist was Harry Clarke, whose usual medium was stained glass.

An expanse of lawn lies between the book rooms, two large circular pools containing obelisk fountains lie to either side of a low and very plain rectangular monument. Beyond this wide shallow steps lead to a simple stone cross. The exquisitely carved inscriptions on the walls around the cross, in Gaelic and English, refer to the 49,400 Irish soldiers lost between 1914 and 1918.

My maternal great grandfather, Edward O’Leary, and paternal grandfather, James Roche, Irish men both, fought in the First World War. Thankfully both survived, although Grandad Roche as I called him, was wounded on the Somme. But I can’t help thinking that they must have known some of the men listed in the books housed in the book rooms of the memorial.

The calm elegance of Lutyens’ Gardens and monuments provide a peaceful oasis on the outskirts of a busy city. But also serve to remind us of the scale of the losses of the First World War. How sad to think that WW1 was not the war to end all wars and that so many parts of the world are still mired in bloody conflicts.

Mark Street, Dublin 1 October 2024

The herbaceous borders around the perimeters of the rose gardens are going strong. Including the Romneya coulteri, this one looking for all the world like a crinkly fried egg.

Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2023

5 July 2023

The designers of the show gardens in this year’s festival successfully conveyed the message that we gardeners cannot ignore the fact that our climate is becoming dryer and hotter. We need to put sustainability into practice by making our outside spaces resilient to such changes. Alongside this, and often as a consequence of gardening in this manner, we can attract and sustain the wildlife which would otherwise fall prey to climate change, pollution, the indiscriminate use of pesticides and the mania for covering our domestic open spaces with artificial grass or impermeable hard landscaping.

Tom Massey’s RHS Resilient Garden contained clever solutions to some of these threats. In the sunny front garden area, freshly dug gravel was replaced with recycled aggregate made from construction waste. ‘Rubblazzo’ paving made with such waste also featured. Rather than excess water produced by heavy rain storms overwhelming the sewage system, run-off was reduced by gathering the water into a wide shallow pool spanned by a boardwalk constructed from reclaimed timer. Day lilies, Agapanthus and (I think) Origanum vulgare contributed to a predominantly yellow, blue and mauve colour palette. To coincide with the unveiling of this inspirational garden, Tom Massey has penned a book for the RHS, Resilient Garden: Sustainable Gardening for a Changing Climate.

Unlike the Chelsea Flower Show where only invited guests get to step onto the show gardens, many of the Hampton Court gardens encouraged you to walk through them, a far more immersive experience than standing behind a rope and craning your neck to see the furthermost corners of the exhibit. The path in the RHS Wildlife Garden designed by Jo Thompson and Kate Bradbury replicated an old railway track with disused industrial land on one side (suggested by rusting machinery) and the rear portions of urban gardens on the other. If proof were needed that the clever planting in this garden was specifically designed to attract pollinators, the flowers of purple orchids and bergamot (Monarda didyma) were being mobbed by small skipper butterflies. The planting scheme included the native hawthorn, Crataegus monogyna, often cited as one of the best species for providing a food source for wildlife: nectar rich flowers in spring for invertebrates and juicy berries in the autumn for birds.

The winding path in Carol Klein’s RHS Iconic Horticultural Hero Garden passed six habitats: a bog garden representing wetlands, a small wood planted with beech trees, a native species rich hedgerow, a meadow blending grass and perennials, a rocky mountainside area for alpine species which merged into a shingly beach. The variety of species and cultivars used throughout was hugely impressive, as you’d expect from an expert plantswoman like Carol Klein, exemplified by these purple, mauve and silver shades in differing flower forms creating an exquisite painterly effect. There was even a vegetable patch and a greenhouse in which Carol could be seen sharing propagation technique tips with visitors. The plants used in the gravelly seaside garden were raised for the show by Beth Chatto’s Plants and Gardens. I loved the blend of mauves and deep pinks of Verbena officinalis var. grandiflora ‘Bampton’ and Allium sphaerocephalon punctuated occasionally with pops of yellow and flowing Stipa tenuissima.

A restful pool sat at the heart of the Cancer Research UK Legacy Garden designed by Paul Hervey-Brookes. Looking at the photographs now, it is hard to imagine that a month earlier this tranquil space would have been a construction site. The willows and hostas sprouting between the massive rocks edging the pool gave the garden an air of permanence and screened visitors onto the garden from the show hubbub a few metres away.

I enjoyed the theatricality of the Oregon Garden, where a mini vineyard sat alongside a colourful meadow bordering a miniature lake. White corncockle (Agrostemma githago) shone out alongside pink and yellow Achillea, the overall palette deepened by burgundy Hylotelephium (formerly Sedum).

The key components for attracting and protecting wildlife (food, water and shelter) could be seen in a couple of the smaller show gardens. In the Nurturing Nature in the City garden by Viriditas, the walls created from stone-filled gabions would provide ideal homes for solitary bumble-bees as well as cover for small mammals. Ponds in rectangular boxes made from scaffolding boards made habitats for amphibians and invertebrates and drought tolerant and nectar rich flowers such as Achillea and Salvia nemorosa Caradonna were attractive for bees and butterflies. I liked the free-standing vertical garden idea where climbers like honeysuckle (a favourite for night-flying insects like moths) were being encouraged to grow up railway sleepers and along strainer wire fitted between the sleepers.

More wildlife friendly and sustainable ideas were included in The Wildlife Trusts: Renters’ Retreat designed by Zoe Claymore. This was full of clever solutions for making a garden which might have to be packed up and moved to a new space: a mini-pond in a pot; steel raised beds that can be dismantled and moved elsewhere, a tree planted in a container. The densely planted ferns and Lady’s mantle (Alchemilla mollis) supplied cover for insects and small mammals whilst bees and hoverflies would be drawn to the nectar in the foxgloves (Digitalis purpurea).

Hedges make wonderful habitats for wildlife. The Traditional Townhouse Garden designed by Lucy Taylor Garden Design was surrounded by copper beech hedging, with the burgundy colour scheme repeated in the bark of Tibetan cherry trees planted into huge pale green containers, underplanted with Lady’s mantle. Oversized chairs of green metal picked up the colour of the containers. A shallow circular pond accessible for amphibians was set within a sedum filled square. A ‘black’ and white planting scheme framed a large bronze apple: the bright white of Gaura lindheimeri ‘Snowbird’ contrasting with the dark petals of Viola cornuta ‘Molly Sanderson’ and Cosmos atrosanguineus.

I believe I am right in saying that ever since the first RHS Hampton Court 30 years ago, rose growers have exhibited in their own marquee, rather than the enormously long Floral Marquee. This makes for a wonderfully concentrated experience of exquisite flowers and fragrance.

There are another two ways in which Hampton Court contrasts with Chelsea: dogs on leads are permitted and you can buy plants at the show as well as all manner of horticultural accoutrements. Many visitors arrive armed with plastic crate trolleys to accommodate their purchases. I bought a beautiful purple flowered Streptocarpus from Dibbeys of North Wales for a friend’s birthday. It was lovely to chat with Lincolnshire Pond plants who were awarded a gold medal for their display (as they had been in May at Chelsea). In an effort to minimise blanket weed in my pond, I bought oxygenator water shamrock (Marsilea quadrifolia) which I was interested to learn is an underwater fern. I also stocked up on allium bulbs to plant in the autumn from WS Warmenhoven: more Purple Sensation to bulk up those already in the garden. Their display of numerous cultivars arranged against a black background was stunning. Having reviewed my photos, I’m now wishing I had also bought Allium sphaerocephalon which also popped up in several of the show gardens.

This brief account of the day inevitably cannot do justice to a fantastic show which I so enjoyed returning to after an absence of several years. I’ll leave you with a few more images from the day.

Kew Gardens, 22 July 2023

These Walls Have Years

Luton Hoo Walled Garden

In some gardens a sundial helps you to tell the time. At Luton Hoo Walled Garden the walls themselves ARE the timepiece. The octagonal walls enclosing this 4.83 acre space were aligned to capture the maximum amount of sunlight to aid the production of peaches and other tender fruits.

…some walls face the direction of sunrise and sunset at the spring and autumn equinoxes and at the midsummer and midwinter solstices, maximising the sunlight on the walls
Short History of the Luton Hoo Estate 2022

The Walled Garden was commissioned by John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute shortly after he bought the 300 acre Luton Hoo estate on the Hertfordshire/Bedfordshire border in 1763. Having engaged Robert Adam, the eminent architect of the time, to redesign the older mansion, he selected landscape architect Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown, to reshape the park land surrounding it in the fashionable English landscape style with which Brown had made his name. As part of his vision for the estate, Capability Brown chose a 10 acre site on the highest part of the land, sheltered on two sides by woodland, on which to build a garden to supply the big house with vegetables and fruit as well as raising flowers with which to decorate the mansion. Within the 10 acre site, a 4.83 acre octagonal enclosure was built surrounded by high brick walls.

In the following decade Bute built a conservatory within the octagon for the rare species of plants he had collected throughout his life, including during his time advising George III’s parents Frederick and Augusta, Prince and Princess of Wales, on the development of a botanic garden in Kew. He also had a catalogue compiled in 1777 of the plants grown on the estate which has been consulted when selecting some of the plants now grown in the Walled Garden. That conservatory was dismantled by Lord Bute’s eldest son, and when the estate was sold to Mr John Shaw Leigh in 1847 he built a new conservatory and boiler house. Leigh also revitalised the garden by installing a new drainage system and underground water storage tanks. The area outside the walls is known as the ‘slips’ where a fine double fronted house was built for the head gardener together with glasshouses. The garden became a showcase of horticultural excellence, producing thousands of bedding plants every year for the formally laid out beds and fruit trees trained into extravagant designs. A vinery housed several grape varieties and out of season carnations were grown in heated glasshouses as well as orchids.

The birth of the Edwardian era brought another change in ownership with Sir Julius and Lady Alice Wernher buying Luton Hoo in 1903. The old conservatory was demolished along with the north-west wall (the eighth wall of the octagon) and a huge range of glasshouses (229 feet long) was commissioned from Edinburgh firm, Mackenzie and Moncur, with a fernery at its centre topped by an elaborate glass cupola, and six smaller houses. More propagation houses were built by Foster and Pearson and 54 gardeners were employed under the leadsership of head gardener Arthur Metcalfe who worked at Luton Hoo until 1934. During the 2WW the Women’s Land Army trained in the Walled Garden. After the war, areas of the garden ceased to be cultivated, and the glasshouses became increasingly expensive to heat and maintain. Part of the garden was used to rear pheasants and a garden centre was established in the northern section of the garden, which operated until 1977, after which the Walled Garden remained unused as a productive area until the first decade of the millennium.

After a research project was instigated to investigate the viability of reviving the garden and opening it to the public, since 2006 the energy and enthusiasm of a loyal cohort of volunteers (now numbering approximately 120) has been harnessed to carry out building conservation work and make a garden which is both decorative and productive. A team of research volunteers continues to uncover the stories behind the garden and the people employed there over the centuries. Thanks to the volunteers, the Walled Garden is one again a cared-for space, accommodating numerous beds and borders producing fruit and vegetables and an array of herbaceous perennials, annuals and shrubs.

The ‘service’ areas beyond the walls, have been sympathetically restored as a unique record of life working in a grand garden at the turn of the C19 into the C20.

At this stage of the conservation project the Edwardian glasshouses remains unglazed, but the framework of the range remains intact and the houses have been made safe to explore. All possible original features have been preserved such as winding mechanisms, ironmongery for opening and closing air vents and decorative grille work on the flooring above the hot water pipes. Whilst it would be wonderful to see the glasshouses restored to their former glory, there is something eerily beautiful about the skeletal forms which dominate the northern side of the garden, facing out to the southern sky to harness as much sunlight as possible as they once did for the generations which have gone before.

I visited Luton Hoo Walled Garden on 7 June, coinciding with one of their Open Wednesdays and joined a guided tour of the garden. Here I learnt that the gardeners referred to early colour photographs of the garden, known as ‘autochromes’, when reinstating the layout of the garden. But whilst honouring the long history of a garden on this site, this garden is not being frozen in time as an example of Edwardian extravagance. The estate owners and volunteers are ensuring that this unique garden can be enjoyed by everyone now and into the future. They are working with SENSE college in Luton to involve young adults with complex disabilities in growing things as well as other outreach projects with the wider community.

The botanical legacy of John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute, is evidenced in the names of several plants. Sadly, like my own handsome regal Pelargonium Lord Bute, those being propagated for sale in the garden’s produce shop suffered despite being protected from last winter’s freezing temperatures. But a week or so after my visit, during my Friday morning stint at Osterley Park and House, head gardener Andy Eddy led us over to the American Border to see the ‘silky camellia’ in flower: Stewartia malecodendron, named for the botanist and aristocrat (and erstwhile Prime Minister!) whose Luton Hoo Walled Garden is going from strength to strength.

4 July 2023

Kew, Surrey

Our Friend in the North: Tom Stuart-Smith at RHS Bridgewater and Trentham Gardens

Tom Stuart-Smith has put his mark as a landscape architect on numerous gardens across the country. I’ve seen his planting at Chatsworth House in Derbyshire and in July 2021 was fortunate to go to the inspiring garden at his home, Serge Hill at Abbots Langley in Hertfordshire. This last weekend gave me the opportunity to compare two more of his creations: the new Royal Horticultural Society garden, Bridgewater, south of Manchester and the Italian Garden at Trentham Gardens, Staffordshire.

Steady rain fell throughout the afternoon at RHS Bridgewater but it meant that the gardens were very quiet enabling us to see the structure of the garden for which Tom Stuart-Smith created the masterplan for the development of the site as a centre of excellence for horticulture in the north-west. He also designed the layout and planting of the Paradise Garden which forms one half of the restored 11 acre Weston Walled Garden, a major feature of the new garden, as well as the Worsley Welcome Garden located close to the Welcome Building.

The joy of a RHS garden (like RBG Kew and other botanical gardens) is that all plants are labelled, so you start learning as soon as you step outside into the garden. A perennial honesty (Lunaria rediviva) soon caught my eye. In borders between the outer and inner walls of the walled garden, massed plantings of tulips and daffodils lit up the gloom of the rainy afternoon. Terracotta rhubarb forcers nestle amongst the bulbs, a clue to the presence at Bridgewater of the National Collection of rhubarb, with 100 cultivars having recently been moved from RHS Wisley. I also liked the gnarly branches (driftwood?) which accent the border every so often, resembling abstract sculptures.

I love to see show gardens from flower shows re-purposed, and the high brick wall of the Weston Walled Garden provided a perfect backdrop for Windrush Garden from RHS Flower Show Tatton Park, 2021, designed by Dawn Evans.

The Weston Walled Garden is divided into two equal halves: the Paradise Garden and the Kitchen Garden. High metal obelisks, designed to resemble the chimney of the original boiler room which heated the glasshouses which served Worsley New Hall, punctuate the enormous Kitchen Garden which contains more than 100 planting beds! Unobtrusive strainer wires are fitted along the walls. to support an impressive collection of wall-trained fruit, including heritage pears.

The heart of the Paradise Garden is a very large body of water, the Lily Pond, fed by two rills which intersect the garden. Partially covered by a decorative grill in a geometric design, the rills are just one example of the wonderful attention to detail manifest throughout Bridgewater. At this time of year and on a wet afternoon, the colours were muted: greens and the reddish brown of the beech columns planted around the Lily Pond. From photographs in the guide book and having seen Serge Hill* in high summer, I can imagine just how colourful the Paradise Garden must be later in the season. One of the features of Serge Hill which impressed me was the Plant Library, trial beds laid out in a numbered grid, designed as an open resource for garden design students to see how plants behave and move, featuring many drought tolerant plants. I’m imagining that some of the species in the Plant Library are also planted into some of the Paradise Garden’s 80 planting beds.

Two new glasshouses in Victorian style have been built along the southern wall of the Paradise Garden, to house tender specimens such as Aeonium. On the opposite side of this wall stands the Old Frameyard, home to the boiler room and its chimney, as well as potting sheds (now an exhibition space), a brand new Propagation House, and beds laid out for plant trials. Near here we spotted another show garden, the Blue Peter Discover Soil Garden designed by Juliet Sargent for the Chelsea Flower Show in 2022.

Just beyond the walled garden stands the restored Garden Cottage, once home to the the head gardener of Worsley New Hall. The cottage is surrounded by an immaculately mowed, semi-circular lawn.

Heading into the wooded area of Bridgewater we found a friendly ent, and in the fields beyond the woodland, the Pig Pen for the black Berkshire pigs which have been used throughout the creation of Bridgewater to act as ‘biological ploughs’ and clear the ground in various parts of the garden before planting. Here and there in the woodland, are remnants of the original gardens and to the north of Ellesmere Lake, the remains of the terraces which stood in front of Worsley New Hall, the large Victorian House which was demolished after the Second World War.

Flowing from Ellesmere Lake down the hill to Moon Bridge Water, the new body of water next to the Welcome Building, is the Chinese Streamside Garden, which is intersected with a series of small pools and crossed by a series of wooden bridges. The planting is designed to reflect the numerous Chinese native plants which are now favourite shrubs and trees in the west: acers, magnolias, primulas included.

Thankfully the weather improved for the second garden visit of the weekend: Trentham Gardens near Stoke-On-Trent, Staffordshire. Here three eminent contemporary garden designers have made their mark on a garden which has its origins as an eighteenth century landscape garden (the lake around which the garden and parkland are located was designed by Capability Brown). Piet Oudolf designed the Floral Labyrinth which stands beside the River Trent at the eastern end of the garden, near the ruins of the Italianate Victorian house: 32 beds of herbaceous perennials in the Dutch designer’s trademark prairie style. The beds were just beginning to spring to life, with tantalising crowns of greenery promising a lush summer display. Snakeshead fritillaries (Fritillaria meleagris) nodded gracefully in several beds.

The Perennial Meadow Garden along the edges of the lake was designed by Professor Nigel Dunnett (Tower of London Superbloom, Gold Meadows London Olympic Park and the Barbican). The third of the designers to shape this garden in the 21st century is Tom Stuart-Smith. When she showed us around her own garden at Serge Hill in July 2021, his sister Kate Stuart-Smith told us her brother’s nickname in the family was GAT, Great Arbiter of Taste! The Italian Garden at Trentham is certainly a class act. Like Bridgewater’s Paradise Garden, it is on a grand scale, a formal parterre style layout of symmetrical beds, some edged with low hedges arranged around low walled formal pools, centred with fountains. The Italian theme is reinforced with classical statuary, monumental urns and slim columns of Irish yew standing in for cypresses. The simplicity of the planting prevents the space from seeming unduly elaborate. One set of beds is planted with white flowers and silver-leaved plants: tulips, narcissus and a white-flowered Brunnera with silver-veined leaves, possibly B. macrophylla Mr Morse.

Low evergreen domes and similarly scaled stands of grasses planted into lawned areas echo the yew domes dotted on the lawn alongside the Worsley Welcome Garden at Bridgewater.

The Italian Garden is divided from the Floral Labyrinth by an arched pergola running its entire length, entwined with climbing roses and Wisteria, yet to bloom. Running alongside the pergola is the David Austin Rose Border, designed by Michael Marriott. I can only imagine how fragrant and beautiful this must be when in flower. The roses were certainly looking wonderfully healthy last Saturday.

Whilst brief, my 36 hour trip to the north west was enormously satisfying, and it was a joy to see Tom Stuart-Smith’s work in both gardens.

20 April 2023, Kew

*Here are some of my images of Tom Stuart-Smith’s garden at Serge Hill, taken in July 2021.

Finding Frogmore

Little did I know on 1 September, as I walked with a friend along The Long Walk in Windsor Great Park, that a few weeks later Queen Elizabeth’s funeral cortege would cover the same ground en route to St George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle. Our destination was Frogmore House and garden, open for charity (in this case Guide Dogs) on one of its three or so fundraising occasions of the year.

Extending to 35 acres, the garden at Frogmore is less than a quarter of the size of Kew Gardens, the other estate influenced by the horticultural enthusiasm of Queen Charlotte, consort to George III. Apart from Frogmore House itself, another major landmark in the grounds is the Royal Mausoleum where Queen Victoria and Prince Albert are buried. The site of this Byzantine style edifice was identified by Victoria within days of her husband’s premature death in December 1861. The Royal Mausoleum has been described as one of the finest Victorian buildings in the country. The imposing building stands across the Frogmore Lake from a smaller mausoleum, built to accommodate the mortal remains of Victoria’s mother, the Duchess of Kent.

The Frogmore estate also features several smaller buildings and follies, all of which combine to create a fascinating landscape from both a historical and garden design point of view. An elegant iron bridge, reminiscent of a bridge across the lake in St James’s Park, crosses Frogmore Lake which twines across the centre of the garden, its sinuous outline emulating a river. Looking back from the promontory to which the bridge leads, there’s a fine prospect of the south western facade of the house. A short walk from the bridge and one can see the Duchess of Kent’s Mausoleum and, nestled at the lake’s edge, the ‘Swiss Seat’, a timber hut dating from around 1833 which the guide book describes as ‘faced with split trunks arranged as gothic blind tracery’.

One of my favourite buildings at Frogmore was Queen Victoria’s Tea House. Built of brick and tiles, it consists of two small rooms joined by a loggia. An enormous Wisteria is trained over the colonnade which surrounds the building. Elaborately decorated chimneys dominate the tiled roofs of each half of the building. There were a few small Wisteria blossoms to be seen, presumably the third flush. This has been a plant which has revelled in the summer’s heat this year it seems, judging by this and the specimen in my own garden. Evidence of the drought was apparent elsewhere at Frogmore, where the soil in the borders (mostly shrubberies) was dry and cracked.

Another Wisteria lent a suitably mysterious air to the Gothic Ruin, almost obscuring its beautifully arched windows. An onion dome tops an elegant white marble structure, the Indian Kiosk, presented to Queen Victoria in 1858. There are few flower beds in the Frogmore garden. The glory of the place is the variety of trees from across the world which, with the lake, create a peaceful parkland within the Great Park itself.