Gardens - Sissinghurst

Unless I'm just going to show you dozens of pictures of snow out the window, we need another topic to look at.  As I was digging out canoeing pictures last month I came across several posts about the gardens we've seen in Europe, mostly in England, so I think that's what I'll share for a few weeks.  Mrs. F.G. stayed hone while I went off on my canoeing adventures, but we went to visit gardens together.  Maybe they'll make us think of spring!  

Perhaps the most famous garden in England is Sissinghurst, located southeast of London in Kent.  We've been there twice.  It's still one of my favourites in memory.

The garden was created by Vita Sackville-West and her husband, Harold Nicholson, a diplomat, starting in 1930.  Harold did the layout of the garden, dividing it into 'rooms', while Vita provided the lush plantings.  This is where the idea of garden 'rooms' is said to have originated, though Vita and Harold got some of their own ideas from Hidcote, a garden we'll visit in the next post.

The medieval tower was and still is the most notable feature.  Vita was a writer and had her writing room in the top of the tower.  Today you can go up and get a view down on the garden from above.

The most famous garden room is the white garden, though looking down from above it doesn't look very white!  Of course the blooms depend on the season you're visiting.  The large green shrub in the centre is a white rose, trained over a gazebo, but not in bloom when we were there.

This view shows more of the 'whiteness' of the garden, as well as the sharply trimmed tiny Boxwood hedges bordering the paths.  Some of the white is provided by foliage as well as blooms.  Many gardeners have gone home and tried this for themselves.

Another dramatic feature is the 'Rondel', a circular space with openings to the four main floral gardens, including the rose garden in one quarter.

At one end of this area you are led to another building, a remnant of the old medeival manor, known to Vita and Harold as the Cottage.  It provided an office for Harold.

In fact, the entire front range of the old buildings dates back to Tudor times.  This was a large medieval manor house, the buildings originally forming a square.  It had been used both as a prison and as soldiers' barracks, so Vita and Harold found it a ruin.  But they fell in love with it and devoted their energy to making it livable while also creating the garden.

Outside the garden but nearby are the old 'oast houses' dating from the 18th and 19th centuries.  These were traditionally used for drying hops before they were sent to the brewer to provide ale.  Today they are used for storage, workshop and exhibition space for the National Trust which owns and runs the garden.  I was fascinated as I had never seen oast houses.before.

One of my favourite garden 'rooms' was the Lime Walk.  Designed and planted by Harold, this was a double row of Lime trees, under-planted with spring bulbs,  I found this quite striking.  In the next post we'll look at Hidcote, another early influential garden which influenced the design of Sissinghurst.  ,.

Finally, a look at the layout shows you how the garden is divided up into 'rooms'.  As you can see, two sides of the ancient moat still exist.