Chippenham Park Gardens – February 8th 2020

Chippenham Park Gardens is in Cambridgeshire, not far from Newmarket, and shouldn’t be confused with the other Chippenham in Wiltshire! I found it in the RHS The Garden magazine and was delighted to find it was open on my birthday and less than an hour from home. It’s not open all the time so check the website before visiting Here

It started with a walled kitchen garden, a bit bare in February, but we were able to peek at the pelagoniums overwintering in the greenhouse and admire the brassicas, then out into trees and grass and the snowdrops begin. You can make your own way round the garden, so we started with the fountain garden at the front.

We meandered past the tennis court to the lake and then over the Japanese bridge into the trees. Here there were lots of snowdrops and they got denser the further we went.

This area is ‘The Wilderness’ and ‘Snowdrops walks’

We took lots of photos!

Walking back to the tearooms we spotted bees in the crocus.

After warming up with lunch we walked along the long border and went through the wall to the Hare Hall gardens.

The leylandii arches from the mound and we enjoyed spinning the seat round to get a panoramic view.

We walked back along ‘Adrians Walk’ which goes round both sides of the top of the lake. It is packed with hellebores and dwarf irises and more bees enjoying the afternoon sun and sweet scents of the  Daphne and Sarcococca.

I will definitely be back, maybe to see the roses in the summer or the Acer walk in the autumn.

Ulting Wick Open Garden April 2019

Here are my pictures from the open day on Sunday April 28th 2019. Awesome tulips in the parterre.

Spot Lou on the plant stall!

Front of house.

Round the lake.

 

 

Swimming pool.

 

I saw this one while in the toilet queue!

 

Wisteria, obviously.

And finally,

The start of the alliums.

Columbine Hall

I came on here tonight to do a quick blog post to and found lots of lovely comments and new followers so thank you and sorry that I took so long to reply, I shouldn’t rely on my email notifications, obviously.

 

Well, life’s been a bit hectic recently, I have been preparing for a large gathering of my dad’s friends and relations to celebrate his life and my head is full if arrangements. Even though it was cold and raining I decided to have a break this afternoon and visit a garden at Columbine Hall not far from home. Thanks for telling me Perfect Perennials!

It’s a beautiful, moated 14th house with winding grassy paths and formal pleached limes.

We went through a lush wilderness and down a tree lined walk to the bog garden which follows a stream and was full of ferns and wild garlic.

 

In a newly planted herb garden there were the same mixture of tulips, in an old copper, as close to the house.

 

At the back of the house is a courtyard garden with a large prostrate rosemary and pretty fencing.

It was busy despite being such difficult weather so I hope that they did well. The warm barn for teas was a very welcome respite and the greenhouse looked busy.

On the way home I stopped to take a photo of these magnificent cherry trees, something that I have been meaning to do for years.

 

 

 

 

Visit to Houghton Hall, Norfolk

Full Moon Circle by Richard Long

Houghton Hall and Gardens in the heart of rural Norfolk, walled gardens, sculptures and a ha ha. We didn’t go in the house as it cost a bit more and there was a separate music festival in the grounds which provided a constant background of banging music, but here’s what we did see, until the camera battery ran out!

There was a combination of permanent sculptures by different artists and the Earth Sky exhibition by Richard Long.  It gave a focus to our wanderings and I do like a map to follow.  Through the stable block courtyard and a block of pleached limes, the first sculpture we stopped at was in front of the house, A Line in Norfolk, made of Norfolk carrstone. And that’s what it is.

The Full Moon Circle, which has been here since 2003, was my favourite and the bossy man was right, it does catch the light better looking towards the house although you want to get the long vista in looking the other way.

 

More sculptures were hidden in an area of hedges and trees and included a solid concrete shed but I really liked the building lined with benches their backs sloped to give the perfect view of the sky through the hole in the roof.

Skyspace Seldom Seen by James Turrell

A round about way back over the vast area of mown grass, along the ha ha, and retracing our steps through the courtyard to get to the walled garden.

The walled garden is divided into four by hedges, with some of these quarters subdivided, and two main flower borders down the middle. High hedges and small feature gardens mean that you never know what is around the next corner.

Following the outside wall, we are first treated to a bit of cold frame and glasshouse envy. What an amazing place to sit! It has a trickling fountain at the back with goldfish and a stunning view to the long borders out the front. To each side there are more greenhouses with proper work going on.

Cold frames in the walled garden.

Box hedges, so neatly trimmed, are a big feature of the walled garden and next along from here features an intricate pattern of hedges filled with scented bedding and punctuated with clematis.

Clematis pyramids surrounded by beds of chocolate cosmos, heliotrope and scented leaved pelagoniums.

Round the corner, more delights, a mass of pink Japanese anenomes in between the mellow red brick walls and box hedges.

After this, tempted by the sound of running water, I forgot the plan to stick to the edge and went in search of fountains.

In the foreground is Waterflame by Jeppe Hein but I didn’t stay long enough to find out that there is a flame that comes out of the top, it was also here that the battery began to run out on the camera so the next shots required waiting for the battery to charge enough then taking quickly before the camera shut down again. Lesson learnt!

This is the other pond with fountain in the middle and more fish. An enclosed space with only one entrance and full of spirally box and Verbena bonariensis. A peaceful space with tempting benches to sit awhile.

Back on track following the outside wall, some inspirational planting and something that I might be able to recreate on a smaller scale. A great combination of heleniums and sunflowers even if I don’t have the wall for a backdrop.

And the view from that pergola is of an ornamental fruit cage surrounded by dahlias in suitably orangey colours and then more fruit bushes.

There is a border devoted to named dahlias and small but old looking fruit trees. I am afraid by now we were tiring and knowing that we had a long drive home we hurried a bit and I completely missed the vegetable beds. Two herbaceous borders flank the central pathway and a bit late in the day I discovered the rose garden with a pretty sunken fountain and seating area.

The central path in two distinct sections looking towards the glasshouse. Nice mown stripes!

A whiz round the toy soldier collection in the stable block and the shop filled with lovely but very, very expensive artworks and we were done. Well worth the long journey and perhaps a return visit when the roses are out.

The front/back (where the drive is) Houghton Hall 

Spring Visit to Beth Chatto Gardens

I took the family to visit the Beth Chatto Gardens  a couple of weekends ago now. It was a free entry day so I got to take loads of photos and enthuse about the plants but didn’t feel obliged to spend hours there to get my money’s worth.

The garden covers 7 acres comprising of lawns, beds and ponds in the bottom of the valley and woodland and dry areas further up the slopes. There are lots of different paths suitable for a bit of perambulating and exploring and the different age groups visiting were doing what suited them best. With bright spring foliage, the mature trees created a cohesive link throughout the garden.

The dry garden used to be a car park and gets no irrigation so is perfect inspiration in this parched spring. The erysmiums and euphorbias were looking great, spikey yuccas, grasses and alliums to come.

Sometimes seen as a problem area, the woodland is the place to see hundreds of uncurling ferns, comfrey and arums as well as a surprising pink Rubus spectabilis ‘Olympic Double’. Really cool and green with a little stream running through to the reservoir at the bottom.  The yellow flower I have yet to look up!

Impressive skunk cabbage at the back!

A series of ponds, linked by bridges and streams, are generously planted with damp loving  species. Ferns, irises, Persicaria and bergenia.  Lots of grasses and phormiums on the banks, all beautifully reflected in the water.

I loved the self seeded forget-me-nots and the odd weed in the beds. A whole new planting scheme was taking place in a large sunny area which will showcase even more plants to illustrate Beth Chatto’s mantra ‘right plant, right place’.

The attached nursery grows and sells a lot of the plants found in the gardens. They are helpfully arranged according to habitat, dry, damp, shady and scree making it easy select what you want. There was a good choice of, mostly herbaceous, varieties and I did buy a few. Given the extensive selection on offer my quote of the day had to be “I think I’ll go for pansies they flower ok”.

And my confession of the day? I didn’t try the cake, sorry but the number of people eating must mean it’s good!