![Hidcote34](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/Hidcote34.JPG)
Hidcote Manor Garden is a garden in the United Kingdom, located at the village of
Hidcote Bartrim
Hidcote Bartrim is a hamlet (place), hamlet and former civil parish, now in the parish of Ebrington, Gloucestershire, Ebrington, in the Cotswold (district), Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. The nearest town is Chipping Campden, whi ...
, near
Chipping Campden
Chipping Campden is a market town in the Cotswold district of Gloucestershire, England. It is notable for its terraced High Street, dating from the 14th century to the 17th century. ("Chipping" is from Old English ''cēping'', 'market', 'market- ...
,
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire ( abbreviated Glos) is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn and the entire Forest of Dean.
The county town is the city of Gl ...
. It is one of the best-known and most influential
Arts and Crafts gardens in Britain, with its linked "
garden room
In gardening, a garden room is a secluded and partly enclosed space within a garden that creates a room-like effect. Such spaces have been part of garden design for centuries. Generally they are regarded as different from terraces and patios just ...
s" of hedges, rare trees, shrubs and
herbaceous border
A herbaceous border is a collection of perennial herbaceous plants (plants that live for more than two years and are soft-stemmed and non-woody) arranged closely together, usually to create a dramatic effect through colour, shape or large scale. ...
s. Created by
Lawrence Johnston, it is owned by the
National Trust
The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...
and is open to the public.
History
The Americans,
Lawrence Johnston and his mother, settled in Britain about 1900, and Lawrence immediately became a British citizen and fought in the British army during the
Boer war
The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the Sou ...
. In 1907 Johnston's mother, Mrs Gertrude Winthrop (she had re-married), purchased the Hidcote Manor Estate. It was situated in a part of Britain with strong connections to the then-burgeoning
Arts and Crafts movement and an Anglicized American artistic expatriate community centred nearby at
Broadway, Worcestershire
Broadway is a large village and civil parish in the Cotswolds, England, with a population of 2,540 at the 2011 census. It is in the far southeast of Worcestershire, close to the Gloucestershire border, midway between Evesham and Moreton-in-Mars ...
.
Johnston soon became interested in turning the fields around the house into a
garden
A garden is a planned space, usually outdoors, set aside for the cultivation, display, and enjoyment of plants and other forms of nature. The single feature identifying even the wildest wild garden is ''control''. The garden can incorporate bot ...
. By 1910 he had begun to lay out the key features of the garden, and by the 1920s he had twelve full-time gardeners working for him.
The garden became a strong influence on the designer
Phyllis Reiss who lived nearby in Dowdeswell Manor. She and her husband bought
Tintinhull Garden
Tintinhull Garden, located in Tintinhull, near Yeovil in the English county of Somerset, is a small (less than an acre) 20th century garden surrounding a 17th-century Grade I listed house. The property is in the ownership of the National Trust. ...
in Somerset in 1933 so that they could have their own gardens based on the Hidcote Manor style.
After World War II Johnston spent most of his time at
Jardin Serre de la Madone
Serre de la Madone (6 hectares) is a garden in France notable for its design and rare plantings. It is located at 74, Route de Gorbio, Menton, Alpes-Maritimes, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France. It is open to the public (every day except Monda ...
, his garden in the south of France; and in 1947 he entrusted Hidcote to the National Trust.
The style of the garden has been widely imitated. In 2007 a temporary garden designed by
Chris Beardshaw
Christopher Paul Beardshaw (born 11 January 1969) is a British garden designer, plantsman, author, speaker and broadcaster.
Background
Beardshaw was formally trained in Horticulture at Pershore College, and holds a BA Hons and PGDip in Landscape ...
that drew inspiration from Johnson's Hidcote was constructed at the
Chelsea Flower Show in London.
Character of Hidcote garden
![Hidcote04](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a3/Hidcote04.jpg)
Lawrence Johnston was influenced in creating his garden at Hidcote by the work of
Alfred Parsons and
Gertrude Jekyll, who were designing gardens of hardy plants contained within sequences of outdoor "
garden room
In gardening, a garden room is a secluded and partly enclosed space within a garden that creates a room-like effect. Such spaces have been part of garden design for centuries. Generally they are regarded as different from terraces and patios just ...
s". The theme was in the air:
Vita Sackville-West
Victoria Mary, Lady Nicolson, CH (née Sackville-West; 9 March 1892 – 2 June 1962), usually known as Vita Sackville-West, was an English author and garden designer.
Sackville-West was a successful novelist, poet and journalist, as wel ...
and
Harold Nicolson's
Sissinghurst Castle Garden
Sissinghurst Castle Garden, at Sissinghurst in the Weald of Kent in England, was created by Vita Sackville-West, poet and writer, and her husband Harold Nicolson, author and diplomat. It is among the most famous gardens in England and is design ...
was laid out as a sequence of such spaces, without, it seems, direct connection with the reclusive and shy Major Johnston. Hidcote's outdoor "rooms" have various characters and themes, achieved by the use of box
hedge
A hedge or hedgerow is a line of closely spaced shrubs and sometimes trees, planted and trained to form a barrier or to mark the boundary of an area, such as between neighbouring properties. Hedges that are used to separate a road from adjoin ...
s,
hornbeam
Hornbeams are hardwood trees in the flowering plant genus ''Carpinus'' in the birch family Betulaceae. The 30–40 species occur across much of the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere.
Origin of names
The common English name ''hornbeam ...
and
yew, and stone walls. These rooms, such as the 'White Garden' and '
Fuchsia
''Fuchsia'' () is a genus of flowering plants that consists mostly of shrubs or small trees. The first to be scientifically described, ''Fuchsia triphylla'', was discovered on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic) ...
Garden' are linked, some by vistas, and furnished with
topiaries
Topiary is the horticultural practice of training perennial plants by clipping the foliage and twigs of trees, shrubs and subshrubs to develop and maintain clearly defined shapes, whether geometric or fanciful. The term also refers to plants ...
. Some have ponds and
fountain
A fountain, from the Latin "fons" (genitive "fontis"), meaning source or spring, is a decorative reservoir used for discharging water. It is also a structure that jets water into the air for a decorative or dramatic effect.
Fountains were ori ...
s, and all are planted with flowers in bedding schemes. They surround the 17th century
manor house
A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were held the lord's manorial courts, communal meals w ...
, and there are a number of outhouses and a
kitchen garden
The traditional kitchen garden, vegetable garden, also known as a potager (from the French ) or in Scotland a kailyaird, is a space separate from the rest of the residential garden – the ornamental plants and lawn areas. It is used for grow ...
.
Johnston's care in selecting the best plants is reflected in the narrow-leaved lavender,
Lavandula angustifolia
''Lavandula angustifolia'', formerly ''L. officinalis'', is a flowering plant in the family Lamiaceae, native to the Mediterranean (Spain, France, Italy, Croatia etc.). Its common names include lavender, true lavender and English lavender (though ...
'Hidcote', in the
Penstemon
''Penstemon'' , the beardtongues, is a large genus of roughly 250 species of flowering plants native mostly to the Nearctic, but with a few species also found in the North American portion of the Neotropics. It is the largest genus of flowering ...
'Hidcote Pink' and in the hybrid
Hypericum
''Hypericum'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Hypericaceae (formerly considered a subfamily of Clusiaceae). The genus has a nearly worldwide distribution, missing only from tropical lowlands, deserts and polar regions. Many ''Hy ...
'Hidcote Gold', acclaimed as the finest hardy
St John's Wort
''Hypericum perforatum'', known as St. John's wort, is a flowering plant in the family Hypericaceae and the type species of the genus '' Hypericum''.
Possibly a hybrid between '' H. maculatum'' and '' H. attenuatum'', the species can be found ...
,
Alice Coats records.
[Coats, ''Garden Shrubs and Their Histories'' (1964) 1992, s.v. 'Hypericum']
See also
*
History of gardening
The early history of gardening is largely entangled with the history of agriculture, with gardens that were mainly ornamental generally the preserve of the elite until quite recent times. Smaller gardens generally had being a kitchen garden as t ...
*
Kiftsgate Court Gardens
Kiftsgate Court Gardens is situated above the village of Mickleton in the county of Gloucestershire, England, in the far north of the county close to the county border with both Worcestershire and Warwickshire.
The gardens, famed for its ...
References
Further reading
* Clarke, E. (2009) ''Hidcote: the making of a garden''
*
*
* Whitsey, F. (2011) ''The Garden at Hidcote''
External links
Hidcote Manor Garden information at the National TrustPhotos of Hidcote Manor Garden and surrounding area on geograph.org.ukHidcote Manor on Topiary in the United Kingdom
{{Authority control
Gardens in Gloucestershire
National Trust properties in Gloucestershire
Tourist attractions in Gloucestershire