Innholdsfortegnelse for June 2025 i The English Garden

Paula McWaters Garden writer and editor Paula travels widely, ever-curious to hear gardeners’ experiences and test their recommendations in her own Kent garden. She writes about Orchard Cottage on page 70. Jean Vernon Jean is an award-winning writer and the best-selling author of The Secret Lives of Garden Bees. She writes about and gives talks on bumblebees and pollinators. She visits Westbrook House on page 61. Barbara Segall Barbara is an editor and award-winning writer based in Suffolk. She enjoys discovering more about gardeners and their plants. She visits two gardens in this issue, Mary Giblin’s (page 50) and Richard Mabey’s (page 173).…

Liz Nicholson The managing director of sustainable design practice Nicholsons discusses her role as a judge at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show I was a field vegetable technologist specialising in iceberg lettuce until I married my husband, Neil, whose father owned Nicholsons Nurseries. We moved from the Moray Coast down to Oxfordshire and I set up a garden design practice to add to the business. We now have a team of 200 garden designers, landscape architects, ecologists, arboriculturists, foresters: everyone in the office inspires and educates one another. The best part of a project is getting to know the client. You form an intimacy when creating a garden for someone and looking at how it relates to their home and how they will spend time in it. Sustainability is at…

When you break a few rules, throw away the graph paper and harness the knowledge and expertise of two charismatic and creative men, the results can be quite astonishing. Enveloped by acres of ancient apple orchard and a landscape considered by many to be beyond magical, the garden at Westbrook House doesn’t disappoint. It was gently crafted by Keith Anderson and David Mendel from a former pony paddock, and they present an energetic perspective and a fascinating insight into using colour and texture, cleverly combined with the power of the landscape beyond. What sets this garden apart from its peers is its exceptional collection of plants, living sculpture and horticultural surprises. Across the four-acre plot there are plants to tantalise the most knowledgeable botanists, often used in breathtakingly inspirational and…

The fluttering flowers of Siberian irises are a magical sight in early summer, like a flight of butterflies on the wing, their elegant blooms providing colour and interest in that tricky gap between the last of the spring bulbs and summer perennials reaching their peak. Although they are often overlooked in favour of the flamboyant but trickier to grow bearded irises, the delicate beauty of Siberian irises belies a toughness that means they can withstand pretty much anything the British weather throws at them. Siberian irises are clump-forming herbaceous perennials with attractive grass-like foliage and slender, branching flower stems that will each bear up to five flowers between mid-May and the end of June, depending on the cultivar. The distinctive flowers, which are loved by bees, are made up of…

Fergus Garrett of Great Dixter frequently gives a talk on the biodiversity that can be found within the famous East Sussex garden. The wealth of wildlife discovered in regular biodiversity audits of the Dixter site proves that cultivated gardens, full of intensive horticulture, can be just as rich in species as areas left to nature’s own devices, if not more so. It’s partly the diversity of habitats that makes Dixter so rich (there’s woodland and meadow as well as garden) and partly its management (no sprays have been used in the past two decades), but it’s also thanks to the huge array of different plants that are grown there. Within the mix are a generous amount of native wildflowers, not just the common spotted orchids that cover the Topiary Lawn’s…

It’s been 30 years since a group of garden owners in Cornwall got together to form The Great Gardens of Cornwall to better promote this collective of the county’s best gardens to visit. Not that garden lovers need much encouragement to head to Cornwall to get their fix of gorgeous plants. Towering cordylines, groves of tree ferns, hydrangeas weighed down by clusters of pink and blue blooms, spires of echiums... these are the plants that spring to mind whenever anyone says ‘Cornish garden’. Our most south-westerly county is bathed by the Gulf Stream, so gardens are seldom troubled by hard frosts, which enables a far wider range of tender and borderline hardy plants to be grown. You need only look at our feature about Tresco Abbey Gardens on page 39…

Making a botanical bas-relief is a magical process. Because I’m a keen gardener and really enjoy working with plants, I think of it as casting the garden itself. All of my work is part of an ongoing experiment, and even now I accept the fact that some pieces will be successful and some won’t. If I’m not a fan of a cast I’ve made, I put it to one side. When I come back to it, I often discover new qualities in the work. Imperfection is part of the beauty of nature, and it is integral to my artistic process. I’m a sort of a court painter or portrait photographer. I can go to a garden and capture a specific moment in time, or I can cast the flowers to…

When I was a child we usually took our holidays in Cornwall and I remember being dragged around lots of gardens while we were away. I was less fond of gardening in those days, and mostly interested in the sticks of rock or tins of sweets that usually followed the visits if the garden had a gift shop. Now I look back and think ‘what a waste!’ I’d love to plan a summer trip to explore all those beautiful Cornish gardens again, and especially the one that tops so many people’s lists: Tresco Abbey Gardens. In the meantime, our feature about it on page 39 will have to quench my longing to see all those excitingly exotic plants flourishing in such a beautiful setting. I might have been a reluctant…

Little does justice to Tresco Abbey Garden, not only because it harbours a staggering 2,500 plant species, but also because of its sensuous depth: an interplay of colour and texture, scent and sound, shadow and light. “I can glance at a plant throughout the day, and suddenly something changes – maybe it’s caught in a ray of sunlight or a bud opens – and I feel so fortunate to catch those moments,” says head gardener Andrew Lawson, who has worked at the garden for almost 40 years. “I never tire of catching grasses when they sparkle with a hint of dew in early morning, or seeing different flowers open each day.” Perched on a tiny island in the Atlantic Ocean, this remarkable garden in the Isles of Scilly is blessed…

Jane Collins’ passion for plants knows no bounds. “Every time I see a new plant, I fall in love with it,” she says, “I think there are only about five plants in the world I don’t like!” This could of course make visits to plant fairs and her favourite garden centre a costly business, but Jane is also discerning. “My mother Smoo and I once visited a garden that was billed as a plant collection, and it made us both feel a bit unwell because all the plants were dotted about in a small space, rather like a vegetable patch,” she explains. “I think each plant has a character and you need to respect that and work with it. If I see foxgloves grown in a straight line it feels…

Early evening in Heather Russell’s garden is when the light is at its finest, shining through fragile poppies and softly touching the edges of topiary. She describes it as an almost spiritual experience, fulfilling on so many different levels: artistic, academic and physical. It looks very different now to how it was when Heather and her husband John first took stock of this abandoned plot. “When we moved here,” she says, “it wasn’t really to garden. I was busy with the children, doing upholstery and exercising racehorses, but I loved being outdoors and then we saw this!” The garden was derelict and rubbish-strewn – the couple discovered a pile of coke, plate-glass windows, an old bath and a dilapidated caravan – but there was also an overgrown walled garden. “You…

It may seem an unlikely setting for love, but it was at the Harrogate Flower Show that Colin Parton, at the tender age of 16, fell for a brown-eyed beauty who stood head and shoulders above the rest, conspicuous in both name and nature. “This group of beautiful delphiniums was displayed on a stage in pots, but it was one called ‘Conspicuous’ that really caught my eye,” he recalls. “I remember thinking: ‘now that’s what you call a delphinium’.” He went home empty-handed but later ordered three D. elatum cultivars – ‘Michael Ayres’, ‘Cristella’ and the eye-catching ‘Conspicuous’ – from specialist nursery Blackmore & Langdon, growing them in his parents’ garden. Half a century on, and Colin’s love for these spectacular herbaceous perennials is undiminished. Even today, Delphinium ‘Conspicuous’ still…

When you move to a new garden you are often advised to leave it for a season or a year to learn what is growing there, assess what does well and consider what you might like to keep or remove. Nature writer Richard Mabey takes this process to its most detailed level, spread over many years, which encapsulates his personal philosophy about gardens and gardening. “I am not a gardener – full stop,” is his first declaration. “I did little bits of gardening when I lived in the Chilterns, but I am temperamentally and categorically not a gardener, while my partner Polly is absolutely and temperamentally a gardener.” This makes for an unusual dynamic and produces some interesting results, particularly in the kitchen garden, which is Polly’s domain. “My part…

This intensely fragrant, strawberry-flavoured grape is a tiny, complex bomb of loveliness A‘Fragola’ grape bursts in your mouth with the layered sweetness of a sun-warmed terrace on a Tuscan hillside. This intensely fragrant, strawberry-flavoured grape is a tiny, complex bomb of loveliness that will transport you on a wave of longing stretching from the golden haze of a late September harvest back to olive groves vivid with scarlet poppies at the beginning of summer. With a charming sense of romance, even the RHS advises ‘the fruits are best eaten straight from the vine’. Rather wonderfully, for all its built-in Italian charisma, ‘Fragola’ is one of the toughest and easiest grapes to grow outdoors, here in the UK. It is fully hardy, disease- and mildew-resistant and self-fertile – no need for…

June is the closest my garden gets to summer perfection. Everything is completely irrepressible, bursting with vigour and lushness, as yet unblemished by nibbled petals, holey leaves, and those little crispy dead bits that catch your eye. For now, there are blowsy flowers fit to drive a florist into ecstasies of delight, and foliage that’s as lush and leafy as any artist could paint, all buzzing with bees and bright with the joy of life. June is the season of unstoppable flowering as every plant from the tiniest erigeron to the most voluptuous rose flowers its little socks off, vying for pollinators and stretching their stems towards that oh-so-welcome warmer sun, and relishing the longer days of non-stop photosynthesising. I’m at one with the plants on these longer days, my…

When Mary Giblin and her husband Nick were looking for their new home, there were a couple of ‘definitely nots’ on their list. “What I did not want was a swimming pool or a pond or lake with any depth, but of course, we’ve ended up with both,” Mary says. Now she admits that the lake is one of the most beautiful things in the garden, unbelievably relaxing simply to look at. So far, she says, she hasn’t had the time to sit and enjoy the garden she has created around the swimming pool. The garden at the front of the house, which sits on the Suffolk-Essex border, would be enough on its own, but there is much more behind the property, where large deep borders lead the eye towards…

Choosing your plants with thought can inject scent, structure, depth and colour into your schemes, notes David Thresher, senior gardener at the National Trust’s Berrington Hall in Herefordshire. David has been instrumental in developing a new flower garden that will open this June. “We’ve created the garden to recapture the Georgian love of surprise and theatre, and bring more flowers than ever in to the Capability Brown-designed pleasure grounds,” he says. His palette of purple and white flowers brings both drama and softness to planting schemes on the estate. “Each of the flowers I suggest can be seen at Berrington Hall.” Berrington Hall, Leominster, Herefordshire HR6 0DW. Tel: 01568 615721; nationaltrust.org.uk/berrington-hall 1 Echinacea purpurea ‘Magnus’ “This echinacea can reach 1m tall, adding useful height to the new herbaceous borders,” says David.…

Roses that scale the heights Climbing roses add vertical interest and can cover less photogenic garden elements with their beautiful blooms ‘Madame Grégoire Staechelin’ has stood the test of time, having being introduced in 1927. It’s a classic: mid-pink, scented and one of the first pink roses to bloom in May. Good for covering walls and old buildings, it can climb to 7.5m – so give it solid support. Its only catch is that it flowers just once. Dating from the 19th century, compact ‘Blush Noisette’ is suitable for a wall, fence or climbing support. It is repeat flowering, bearing pale-pink-to-white semi-double flowers scented with musk and clove. Ever-popular ‘The Generous Gardener’ bears large, pale pink flowers with a musky myrrh scent. It reaches around 4.5m tall, so use it…

Summer BERRY BLISS Whether it’s a ‘Cambridge Favourite’ strawberry, ‘Glen Ample’ raspberry, classic pale green ‘Invicta’ gooseberry or its wine-coloured relative ‘Hinnonmaki Red’, no English garden should be without a berry or two this summer. For just a little work – simple pruning, some tying in or division – you can gather buckets of juicy fruit all season long. Enjoy them sun-warmed and straight from the bush, or make them the stars of summer parties in jams and jellies, fools and sorbets, cakes and tarts. STRAWBERRIES GOOSEBERRIES RASPBERRIES…

Sudbury Sun Lounger Handmade from steel in a small British workshop. £1,148, rowenandwren.co.uk Capri Lounger Ultra Barlow Tyrie’s slatted teak lounger has a nifty slide-away table. £1,880, teak.com Bamboo Sun Lounger Conjure holiday vibes with this generous lounger. £349, grahamandgreen.co.uk Daybed Made from iroko wood in a workshop in Sussex. £2,250, thedaybedcompany.co.uk HAY Palissade Chaise Longue An iconic design in steel for Danish brand HAY. £1,479, hollowaysofludlow.com Seville Lounger Honey-coloured acacia and toning faux wicker, along with plump cushions, make this lounger ideal for whiling away summer days. £850, coxandcox.co.uk…

The only thing that comes close to pottering around your own garden, is pottering around somebody else’s. Often you’ll come away with ideas – and sometimes plants – for your own garden, and even if you don’t glean something to copy at home, seeing how someone else has treated their space can give you a fresh perspective and reinvigorate your enthusiasm for your own. As the proverb goes, travel broadens the mind, but substitute ‘garden visiting’ for ‘travel’! If you’re planning to get out this summer and visit some gardens, but you’re in need of inspiration, we hope that our guide, in association with garden travel specialists Sisley Garden Tours, will help. Britain’s grand and famous gardens are always fantastic to look around, but it’s also worth venturing off the…