Innholdsfortegnelse for January 15, 2025 i Country Life

Future Publishing Ltd, 121–141 Westbourne Terrace, Paddington, London W2 6JR 0330 390 6591; www.countrylife.co.uk NO one ever said January was a great month for gardening. It is, however, an excellent time for dreaming up schemes for your garden from the comfort of an armchair by the fire. Take a tip from Nature and enjoy the dormant season for what it is. Here, to inspire you, are our 10 garden commandments. 1 Dig out a copy of In My Garden, an evergreen compilation of writing by the famously provocative COUNTRY LIFE columnist Christopher Lloyd. It includes a splendid anecdote of him backing his car vigorously into a friend’s Elaeagnus x ebbingei—‘a shrub I have particularly disliked for years’—hell bent on its extermination. 2 Ponder rather than act. Winter is a good…

Well wrapped up I HAVE long admired your beautiful wildlife and countryside photographs and wished to give them a new life. This Christmas, I used frosty and festive images to wrap all my small presents to the delight of the recipients. The photograph of the roast potatoes was the favourite. Sophie Woodhouse, Shropshire Column confusion YOU detail that the Monument to the Great Fire of London was an elegant Doric column (‘When time stands still’, December 25, 2024). This was next to a picture of what appeared to be the said monument, but which looked to me very much like a Corinthian column. I noticed the absence of the viewing platform, too, and other aspects that bear no resemblance to the Monument. Have I lost all grip on reality? Jake…

The Artist’s Garden at Giverny by Claude Monet ‘My dad is an artist and I have such a vivid childhood memory of what I know now to be a book of Monet’s garden at Giverny. I was captivated by the beautiful colours, the purples, the pinks, all put together in little strokes. There was something so magical to me that, up close, the dashes of colour had no meaning but their individual beauty, yet, stepping away from the painting, they would come to life and this heavenly landscape would emerge. Lost in the pages of that book, my imagination would take flight and I would walk around those gardens as if they were mine, always settling in my favourite painting, my favourite spot: The Artist’s Garden at Giverny’ Charlotte Mullins…

Gothic grandeur Designed as an elegant piece for an undercover exterior setting, the Paxton bench, £8,640, is based on a George II ‘Gothic’ example. It is made from British kiln-dried beech and shown here with a gently aged earth-yellow finish, from Jamb (020–7730 2122; www.jamb.co.uk) Time honoured The Queen Anne seat by Andrew Crace, shown here painted in Morning Blue, costs from £4,450 for a two-seater (01279 842685; www.andrewcrace.com) Comfort cocoon The Pimlico Club Highback chair, £1,595, is made from all-weather outdoor rope with solid-teak tapered legs and Charcoal cushions for comfort, from Indian Ocean (020–8675 4808; www.indian-ocean.co.uk) Sitting pretty The Large Wrought Iron garden bench, £950, is a charming—and robust—choice, from Susie Watson Designs (0344 980 8185; www.susiewatsondesigns.co.uk) Classic-contemporary Made from a woven resin fibre designed for outdoor use,…

THERE were many reasons why milliners did such a roaring trade in London a century ago: from the trilby to the top hat and from the boater to the snap brim, etiquette and class demarcation played a major role in the ubiquity of headwear. However, there was a more prosaic reason, too. Put simply, if you wanted to ride on the top deck of a London bus, there was a fair chance that, without a hat, you were liable to get a soaking and perhaps even have to open your umbrella. For it was a century ago that the very first double-decker buses with covered tops were embarking on their maiden journeys around the capital. Their roll-out was more than a little haphazard, because London Transport as we know it…

WITH global uncertainty still clouding the outlook for the country-house market in 2025, leading agents expect demand to remain strongest in established local hotspots, although good houses in spectacular settings will continue to find buyers, whatever their location. With relatively few new country properties scheduled to come to the market before March this year, the fate of three notable country houses launched on the run-up to Christmas may well indicate which way the wind will blow. Sarah Brown of Knight Frank’s country department (020–7590 2451) is handling the sale of imposing Sandridge Park, set in some 27 acres of gardens, parkland and woodland, 2½ miles from Melksham, Wiltshire, which came to the market in early December with a guide price of £6 million. The pristine 12,389sq ft Georgian-style house, which…

DISASTER turned into fortune for Georgian artist Henry Bone (1755–1834). Born in Truro, Cornwall, to a cabinetmaker, he began training as a china painter at the Cookworthy pottery in Plymouth and moved with it to Bristol once the business was taken over by Richard Champion. He was still there in 1778, when Champion hit hard times. With only a guinea to his name and £5 borrowed from a friend, Bone decided to try his luck in London—and fortune rewarded him. In 1781, after a spell working on fans and watches, he exhibited his first miniature (a portrait of his wife, Elizabeth van der Meulen) at the Royal Academy; by the late 1790s, his work had caught the Royal Family’s eye. He became enamel painter to the Prince of Wales, then…

Scotland, the camera loves you SCOTLAND’S land- and cityscapes have been dubbed the new Hollywood, with a handful of new films made there set for release this year. Still riding the Outlander wave, tourist boards are primed for a boost in interest, much like the one New Zealand enjoyed after ‘The Lord of the Rings’ film adaptations brought its remote locations to the masses. Last autumn, American actor Glen Powell was spotted in Glasgow shooting sci-fi film The Running Man (based on the 1982 novel by Stephen King), due for release in November. The city appears to be highly versatile; it’s where (together with Linlithgow) new Sky drama Lockerbie: A Search For Truth, starring Colin Firth, was filmed and it has also passed in recent years for London (Hobbs &…

COUNTRY people have learned to raise the red flag when big business touts environmental reasons to excuse its actions. The latest example is in north Somerset where EDF, the French state-owned nuclear business, wants to impose a vast new saltmarsh on the River Parrett in place of tranquil, historic countryside and farmland. The company says it’s necessary because it doesn’t want to build the promised acoustic system to counter the environmental damage caused by Hinkley Point C nuclear-power station. This wasn’t in its original planning permission, so why is it trying to foist it on the locality now? Hinkley Point has already been beset by problems and, as seems to be the case with other EDF nuclear schemes, it’s running late and vastly over budget. It is, however, a development…

FOR gardeners of a certain age, a trip to Essex to see the dry gravel garden (above) Beth Chatto (below, 1923–2018) made in 1992 in an old car park was something of a pilgrimage. Here, in the drifts of naturalistic plants that were allowed to self seed, was living proof of her philosophy, set out in her first book, The Dry Garden (1978), and which came to be known by the still popular mantra ‘right plant, right place’. Despite the low rainfall and no watering policy, the plants thrived. Now, the idea that giving plants the conditions to which they have become adapted is taken for granted. It was not so in 1960, when Beth and her husband, Andrew, moved to Elmstead Market, taking on wasteland that had belonged to…

ONE hears a lot about box blight and box moth and, sometimes, it seems that everyone has a story to tell. What do we need to do to prevent or cure an infestation? Is it worth doing so? First, the blight. All plants are susceptible to fungal diseases, but healthy plants usually have a resistance to infection. The first thing to do for box plants, therefore, is to make sure that they are growing well and happily. Box blight is caused by two species of Calonectria fungi and can kill the plant. Most people don’t notice its arrival until the disease is rampant—look out for brown leaves and bare patches. Heavily affected plants should be dug out and destroyed (together with fallen leaves), but most will survive, if you cut…

The Lord Leycester, Warwick, WarwickshireThe home of the Master and Brethren of The Lord Leycester Hospital ON Tuesday, September 25, 1571, the governing bailiff and principal burgesses of Warwick gathered to discuss the news of a forthcoming visit by Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester to the town. The Earl, whose principal seat lay less than five miles away at Kenilworth Castle, was a figure of great importance. Not only was he the outstanding favourite and sometime suitor of Elizabeth I, but his brother, Ambrose, was Earl of Warwick, lord of the town and its castle. The visit, however, presented an embarrassing problem. Earlier in the year, the Earl of Leicester had received royal and parliamentary licence to found a hospital—an almshouse in modern parlance—in perpetuity for a master and 12…

THE day before Elizabeth II was due to fly to Korea in April 1999, Genevieve James, the creative director of royal glove-maker Cornelia James, received an urgent phone call from Buckingham Palace. Worryingly, the dozen pairs of bespoke cotton gloves made for Her Majesty’s trip had not arrived, despite being sent several weeks previously. ‘There was, of course, no time to make more, but, luckily, we had similar ones in stock. I got on my motorbike and roared up to London with them,’ recalls Andrew Lawson, Ms James’s husband and the firm’s managing director. On arrival, however, he faced another obstacle—due to the London Marathon, the palace was in the centre of an exclusion zone and surrounded by lines of police. ‘It took me a good long while to persuade…

Surrey, £3.5 million Wymondley dates from the 1920s and stands in a little over three acres within easy reach of Oxted for fast connections to central London. The gardens face south-west and have a swimming pool, tennis court and a detached double garage. They provide a constant backdrop to the property, which boasts a generous paved terrace for outdoor eating. Attention is focused on an attractive knot garden planted with roses and lavender, divided by a set of steps leading to the lawn. Several beds provide year-round interest and colour, together with a high degree of privacy. A dual-aspect sitting room with a box bay window offers views across the gardens, as does an orangery that extends from the kitchen, providing a space for everyday living and entertainment. Jackson-Stops (01883…

Tresco Abbey Garden, TrescoThe home of Robert and Lucy Dorrien-Smith FEW gardens have their own heliport, yet this is far from the most remarkable of the many extraordinary features of Tresco Abbey Garden, 28 miles off the coast of south-west Cornwall, which, for most people, can only be reached after travelling for the best part of a day. Its history, of which more later, encompasses five generations of one determined and unusually focused family. Its geography—it sits on the southern end of Tresco Island, which itself is only two miles long and forms part of the archipelago of 200 islands, islets and rocks that form the Isles of Scilly—gives it a year-round temperate climate, enabling plants from South Africa, South America and the Mediterranean to thrive. (At the New Year’s…

THIS is my new favourite Japanese anemone. I used to be crazy about ‘Queen Charlotte’, until I met ‘Lorelei’.’ Eminent landscape designer Tom Stuart-Smith is leading an enthused group through the living Plant Library at Serge Hill in Hertfordshire. This is the kind of gold-dust, personal, hot-off-the-press inspiration that will leave you buzzing at the end of the best kind of gardening course. Spend a day with No Dig pioneer Charles Dowding at his admired Somerset plot and you’ll be in action from the moment you get home: ‘We are on a strong waxing moon, which is fantastic for sowing seeds. I’ll be sowing all day tomorrow.’ There is a gentle, deeply encouraging pace at Troy Scott-Smith’s Gardening Through the Seasons courses, which take place over five days, September to…

THE four cornerstones of early English agriculture are celebrated on the Coke Monument at Holkham Hall in Norfolk. A memorial to the agricultural improver Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester, it records his success with sheep breeding, grassland management and mangelwurzels. On the plinth below the 120ft-high, wheatsheaf-topped column are stone sculptures of a plough, a seed drill and Southdown sheep. However, most impressive of all is a massive Devon ox, its horns spread wide as it looks across the sloping parkland. Coke’s prize-winning beast is enjoying its moment. The 1850 monument marks the watershed when, after millennia of service, the ox was rapidly becoming redundant as a beast of burden. We are familiar with the term ox—those lowing beasts attending the Nativity, the ox-eye daisy—and we know we can…

WHEN interior designer Lonika Chande and her husband bought this Victorian former railway worker’s cottage in north-west London, it was in good condition, but had been stripped of any architectural detail. ‘It was a sweet house, but lacked original features,’ explains the decorator, who is known for her warm schemes imbued with saturated colour and interesting patterns. One of the first things she did was apply panelling on the walls and restore a fire surround to create a focal point. Both are painted in a warm neutral. Next, she added colourful textiles. ‘I don’t like anything to match, so have deliberately chosen different shapes of furniture and upholstered pieces in varying materials here,’ she explains. The two-seater armless sofa is upholstered in Dans la Forêt by Décors Barbares (via Tissus…

Smoky leek and butter-bean sourdough pain perdu Ingredients Serves 4 Olive oil, splash of3 large leeks, washed, trimmed, halved lengthwise and sliced1 red onion, finely diced3 garlic cloves, grated1tspn smoked paprika½tspn chilli flakes1tbspn tomato paste1 x 400g can chopped tomatoes200ml vegetable stock3 fresh thyme sprigs2 bay leaves2 x 400g cans butter beans, drained For the sourdough pain perdu 4 thick slices of sourdough bread, cut into 1in cubes2tbspn olive oilFresh parsley, handful of½ lemon, zest of Grated Parmesan (optional) Method 1 Heat a generous splash of olive oil in a large ovenproof casserole dish over medium heat. Add the leeks and cook until softened, but not browned. Remove and set aside, then, to the same pan, add the red onion and garlic, cooking for 2–3 minutes until fragrant. 2 Sprinkle…

The Olive Tree: Around the World Charles Quest-Ritson (Ediciones El Viso, £50) THE image of the olive in Britain has gone in my lifetime from the source of earwax-removal oil to a kind of universal desideratum. The fruit is on a plate in front of me and little sprouting trees appear in gardens everywhere. The power and glory of this fruiting tree is now celebrated on a grand scale in COUNTRY LIFE columnist Charles Quest-Ritson’s superbly illustrated new book. Despite the first glance, this impressive tome is no coffee-table effort. The comprehensively informative text leads us all over the world, to the dusty corners and industrial groves of production on every scale in every sunny nation; it constantly balances the economic with the ornamental, surely the reason for its resonance…

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