William Robinson (5 July 1838 – 17 May 1935) was an Irish practical
gardener
A gardener is someone who practices gardening, either professionally or as a hobby.
Description
A gardener is any person involved in gardening, arguably the oldest occupation, from the hobbyist in a residential garden, the home-owner suppleme ...
and journalist whose ideas about wild gardening spurred the movement that led to the popularising of the
English cottage garden, a parallel to the search for honest simplicity and vernacular style of the British
Arts and Crafts movement, and were important in promoting the
woodland garden
A woodland garden is a garden or section of a garden that includes large trees and is laid out so as to appear as more or less natural woodland, though it is often actually an artificial creation. Typically it includes plantings of flowering shrub ...
. Robinson is credited as an early practitioner of the mixed
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. ...
of hardy
perennial plant
A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also wide ...
s, a champion too of the "wild garden", who vanquished the high Victorian pattern garden of planted-out bedding schemes. Robinson's new approach to gardening gained popularity through his magazines and several books—particularly ''The Wild Garden'', illustrated by
Alfred Parsons, and ''The English Flower Garden''.
Robinson advocated more natural and less formal-looking plantings of hardy
perennial
A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also wide ...
s,
shrub
A shrub (often also called a bush) is a small-to-medium-sized perennial woody plant. Unlike herbaceous plants, shrubs have persistent woody stems above the ground. Shrubs can be either deciduous or evergreen. They are distinguished from trees ...
s, and
climbers
Climber may refer to:
*Climber, a participant in the activity of climbing
*Climber, general name for a vine
*Climber, or climbing specialist, a road bicycle racer who can ride especially well on highly inclined roads
* Climber (BEAM), a robot that ...
, and reacted against the High
Victorian patterned gardening, which used tropical materials grown in
greenhouse
A greenhouse (also called a glasshouse, or, if with sufficient heating, a hothouse) is a structure with walls and roof made chiefly of Transparent ceramics, transparent material, such as glass, in which plants requiring regulated climatic condit ...
s. He railed against standard
rose
A rose is either a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be ...
s, statuary, sham Italian gardens, and other artifices common in gardening at the time. Modern gardening practices first introduced by Robinson include: using alpine plants in
rock garden
A rock garden, also known as a rockery and formerly as a rockwork, is a garden, or more often a part of a garden, with a landscaping framework of rocks, stones, and gravel, with planting appropriate to this setting. Usually these are small A ...
s; dense plantings of perennials and groundcovers that expose no bare soil; use of hardy perennials and native plants; and large plantings of perennials in natural-looking drifts.
[Duthie, p. 12.]
Life and career
Robinson began his garden work at an early age, as a garden boy for the Marquess of Waterford at Curraghmore, County Waterford. From there, he went to the estate of an Irish
baronet
A baronet ( or ; abbreviated Bart or Bt) or the female equivalent, a baronetess (, , or ; abbreviation Btss), is the holder of a baronetcy, a hereditary title awarded by the British Crown. The title of baronet is mentioned as early as the 14th ...
in Ballykilcavan, County Laois,
Sir Hunt Johnson-Walsh, and was put in charge of a large number of greenhouses at the age of 21. According to one account, as the result of a bitter quarrel, one cold winter night in 1861 he let the fires go out, killing many valuable plants. Other accounts consider the story to be a gross exaggeration. Whether in haste after the greenhouse incident or not, Robinson left for
Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...
in 1861, where the influence of
David Moore, head of the botanical garden at
Glasnevin
Glasnevin (, also known as ''Glas Naedhe'', meaning "stream of O'Naeidhe" after a local stream and an ancient chieftain) is a neighbourhood of Dublin, Ireland, situated on the River Tolka. While primarily residential, Glasnevin is also home t ...
, a family friend, helped him find work at the Botanical Gardens of
Regent's Park
Regent's Park (officially The Regent's Park) is one of the Royal Parks of London. It occupies of high ground in north-west Inner London, administratively split between the City of Westminster and the Borough of Camden (and historically betwee ...
, London, where he was given responsibility for the hardy herbaceous plants, specialising in British
wildflower
A wildflower (or wild flower) is a flower that grows in the wild, meaning it was not intentionally seeded or planted. The term implies that the plant probably is neither a hybrid nor a selected cultivar that is in any way different from the w ...
s.
At that time, the
Royal Horticultural Society
The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), founded in 1804 as the Horticultural Society of London, is the UK's leading gardening charity.
The RHS promotes horticulture through its five gardens at Wisley (Surrey), Hyde Hall (Essex), Harlow Carr (Nort ...
's Kensington gardens were being designed and planted with vast numbers of greenhouse flowers in mass plantings. Robinson wrote that "it was not easy to get away from all this false and hideous "art"." But his work with native British plants did allow him to get away to the countryside, where he "began to get an idea (which should be taught to every boy at school) that there was (for gardens even) much beauty in our native flowers and trees."
Robinson was a
vegetarian
Vegetarianism is the practice of abstaining from the consumption of meat (red meat, poultry, seafood, insects, and the flesh of any other animal). It may also include abstaining from eating all by-products of animal slaughter.
Vegetarianism m ...
but did not impose it on others.
Writing
In 1866, at the age of 29, he became a fellow of the
Linnean Society
The Linnean Society of London is a learned society dedicated to the study and dissemination of information concerning natural history, evolution, and taxonomy. It possesses several important biological specimen, manuscript and literature colle ...
under the sponsorship of
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended fr ...
,
James Veitch, David Moore, and seven other distinguished botanists and horticulturists. Two months later, he left Regents Park to write for ''The Gardener's Chronicle'' and ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
'', and represented the leading horticultural firm of
Veitch Veitch or Vetch is a Scottish surname, and may refer to:
Veitch
* Arthur Veitch (1844–1880), horticulturist
* Bill Veitch (1870–1961), New Zealand politician
* Champion Doug Veitch (born 1960), Scottish musician and songwriter
* Colin Vei ...
at the
1867 Paris Exhibition. He began writing many of his publications, beginning with ''Gleanings from French Gardens'' in 1868, ''The Parks, Gardens, and Promenades of Paris'' in 1869, and ''Alpine Flowers for Gardens'', ''Mushroom Culture'', and ''The Wild Garden'' in 1870. In 1871 he launched his own gardening journal, simply name
''The Garden'' which over the years included contributions from notables such as
John Ruskin
John Ruskin (8 February 1819 20 January 1900) was an English writer, philosopher, art critic and polymath of the Victorian era. He wrote on subjects as varied as geology, architecture, myth, ornithology, literature, education, botany and politi ...
,
Oliver Wendell Holmes,
Gertrude Jekyll
Gertrude Jekyll ( ; 29 November 1843 – 8 December 1932) was a British horticulturist, garden designer, craftswoman, photographer, writer and artist. She created over 400 gardens in the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States, and wrote ...
,
William Morris
William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He ...
,
Dean Hole,
Frank Miles
George Francis Miles (22 April 1852 – 15 July 1891) was a London-based British artist who specialised in pastel portraits of society ladies, also an architect and a keen plantsman. He was artist in chief to the magazine ''Life'', and between 1 ...
,
Canon Ellacombe, and
James Britten
James Britten (3 May 1846 – 8 October 1924) was an English botanist.
Biography
Born in Chelsea, London, he moved to High Wycombe in 1865 to begin a medical career. However he became increasingly interested in botany, and began writing paper ...
. ''The Garden: An Illustrated Weekly Journal of Horticulture in All Its Branches'' was published from 1872 to 1927.
His most influential books were ''The Wild Garden'' (1870), which made his reputation and allowed him to start his magazine, and ''The English Flower Garden'' (1883), which he revised in edition after edition and included contributions from his long-time friend Gertrude Jekyll, among others. She later edited ''The Garden'' for a couple of years and contributed many articles to his publications, which also included ''Gardening Illustrated'' (from 1879).
He first met Jekyll in 1875—they were in accord in their design principles and maintained a close friendship and professional association for over 50 years. He helped her on her garden at
Munstead Wood
Munstead Wood is a Grade I listed house and garden in Munstead Heath, Busbridge on the boundary of the town of Godalming in Surrey, England, south-east of the town centre. The garden was created by garden designer Gertrude Jekyll, and became ...
; she provided plants for his garden at Gravetye Manor. Jekyll wrote about Robinson that:
...when English gardening was mostly represented by the innate futilities of the "bedding" system, with its wearisome repetitions and garish colouring, Mr William Robinson chose as his work in live to make better known the treasures that were lying neglected, and at the same time to overthrow the feeble follies of the "bedding" system. It is mainly owing to his unremitting labours that a clear knowledge of the world of hardy-plant beauty is now placed within easy reach of all who care to acquire it, and that the "bedding mania" is virtually dead.
Robinson also published ''God's Acre Beautiful or The Cemeteries of The Future'', in which he applied his gardening aesthetic to urban churchyards and cemeteries. His campaign included trying to win an unwilling public to the advantages of cremation over burial, and he quite freely shared unsavoury stories of what happened in certain crowded graveyards. He was instrumental in the founding of
Golders Green Crematorium
Golders Green Crematorium and Mausoleum was the first crematorium to be opened in London, and one of the oldest crematoria in Britain. The land for the crematorium was purchased in 1900, costing £6,000 (the equivalent of £135,987 in 2021), ...
and designed the gardens there, which replaced the traditional Victorian mourning graveyard with open lawn, flowerbeds, and woodland gardens.
Gravetye Manor
With his writing career a financial success, in 1884 Robinson was able to purchase the Elizabethan
Gravetye Manor
Gravetye Manor is a manor house located near East Grinstead, West Sussex, England. The former home of landscape gardener William Robinson, it is now a hotel and restaurant holding, in 2020, one star in the Michelin Guide, and is a Grade I list ...
near
East Grinstead
East Grinstead is a town in West Sussex, England, near the East Sussex, Surrey, and Kent borders, south of London, northeast of Brighton, and northeast of the county town of Chichester. Situated in the extreme northeast of the county, the civ ...
in Sussex, along with about of rich pasture and woodland. His diary of planting and care was published as ''Gravetye Manor, or Twenty Years of the Work round an old Manor House'' (1911). Gravetye would find practical fulfilment of many of Robinson's ideas of a more natural style of gardening. Eventually it would grow to nearly .
Much of the estate had been managed as a
coppiced woodland, giving Robinson the opportunity to plant drifts of
scilla
''Scilla'' () is a genus of about 30 to 80 species of bulb-forming perennial herbaceous plants in the family Asparagaceae, subfamily Scilloideae. Sometimes called the squills in English, they are native to woodlands, subalpine meadows, and sea ...
,
cyclamen
''Cyclamen'' ( or ) is a genus of 23 species of perennial flowering plants in the family Primulaceae. ''Cyclamen'' species are native to Europe and the Mediterranean Basin east to the Caucasus and Iran, with one species in Somalia. They grow ...
, and
narcissus between the coppiced
hazel
The hazel (''Corylus'') is a genus of deciduous trees and large shrubs native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. The genus is usually placed in the birch family Betulaceae,Germplasmgobills Information Network''Corylus''Rushforth, K. (1999). ...
s and
chestnut
The chestnuts are the deciduous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Castanea'', in the beech family Fagaceae. They are native to temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere.
The name also refers to the edible nuts they produce.
The unrelat ...
s. On the edges, and in the cleared spaces in the woods, Robinson established plantings of
Japanese anemone,
lily
''Lilium'' () is a genus of Herbaceous plant, herbaceous flowering plants growing from bulbs, all with large prominent flowers. They are the true lilies. Lilies are a group of flowering plants which are important in culture and literature in mu ...
,
acanthus, and
pampas grass Pampas grass or pampas-grass is a common name which may refer to any of several similar-looking, tall-growing species of grass:
* Species of ''Cortaderia'' including:
:* ''Cortaderia selloana'' and its selected cultivars
:* '' Cortaderia jubata'' ( ...
, along with shrubs such as
fothergilla
''Fothergilla'' (witch alder) is a genus of two to four species of flowering plants in the family Hamamelidaceae, native to woodland and swamps of the southeastern United States.
They are low-growing deciduous shrubs growing to tall with downy ...
,
stewartia, and
nyssa. Closer to the house he had some flower beds; throughout he planted
red valerian
''Centranthus ruber'', the red valerian, spur valerian, kiss-me-quick, fox's brush, devil's beard or Jupiter's beard, is a popular garden plant grown for its ornamental flowers.
Description
It grows as a perennial plant, usually as a subshrub t ...
, which he allowed to spread naturally around paving and staircases. Robinson planted thousands of daffodils annually, including 100,000 narcissi planted along one of the lakes in 1897. Over the years he added hundreds of trees, some of them from American friends
Charles Sprague Sargent
Charles Sprague Sargent (April 24, 1841 – March 22, 1927) was an American botanist. He was appointed in 1872 as the first director of Harvard University's Arnold Arboretum in Boston, Massachusetts, and held the post until his death. He pub ...
and
Frederick Law Olmsted
Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is considered to be the father of landscape architecture in the USA. Olmsted was famous for co- ...
. Other features included an oval-shaped walled kitchen garden, a heather garden, and a water garden with one of the largest collections of
water lilies
''Water Lilies'' (or ''Nymphéas'', ) is a Serial imagery, series of approximately 250 oil paintings by French Impressionism, Impressionist Claude Monet (1840–1926). The paintings depict his Fondation Monet in Giverny, flower garden at Fond ...
in Europe.
Robinson invited several well-known painters to portray his own landscape artistry, including the English watercolourist Beatrice Parsons, the landscape and botanical painter
Henry Moon, and Alfred Parsons. Moon and Parsons illustrated many of Robinson's works.
After Robinson's death, Gravetye Manor was left to the
Forestry Commission
The Forestry Commission is a non-ministerial government department responsible for the management of publicly owned forests and the regulation of both public and private forestry in England.
The Forestry Commission was previously also respon ...
, who left it derelict for many years. In 1958 it was leased to a restaurateur who refurbished the gardens, replacing some of the flower beds with lawn. Today, Gravetye Manor serves as a hotel and restaurant.
Long-term impact on gardening
Through his magazines and books, Robinson challenged many gardening traditions and introduced new ideas that have become commonplace today. He is most linked with introducing the herbaceous border, which he referred to by the older name of 'mixed border'—it included a mixture of shrubs, hardy and half-hardy herbaceous plants. He also advocated dense plantings that left no bare soil, with the spaces between taller plants filled with what are now commonly called ground cover plants. Even his rose garden at Gravetye was filled with
saxifrage
''Saxifraga'' is the largest genus in the family Saxifragaceae, containing about 465 species of holarctic perennial plants, known as saxifrages or rockfoils. The Latin word ''saxifraga'' means literally "stone-breaker", from Latin ' ("rock" or " ...
between and under the roses. Following a visit to the
Alps
The Alps () ; german: Alpen ; it, Alpi ; rm, Alps ; sl, Alpe . are the highest and most extensive mountain range system that lies entirely in Europe, stretching approximately across seven Alpine countries (from west to east): France, Sw ...
, Robinson wrote ''Alpine Flowers for Gardens'', which for the first time showed how to use alpine plants in a designed rock garden.
His most significant influence was the introduction of the idea of naturalistic gardening, which first appeared in ''The Wild Garden'' and was further developed in ''The English Flower Garden''. The idea of introducing large drifts of native hardy perennial plants into meadow, woodland, and waterside is taken for granted today, but was revolutionary in Robinson's time. In the first edition, he recommended any plant that could be naturalised, including half-hardy perennials and natives from other parts of the world—thus Robinson's wild garden was not limited to locally native species. Robinson's own garden at Gravetye was planted on a large scale, but his wild garden idea could be realised in small yards, where the 'garden' is designed to appear to merge into the surrounding woodland or meadow. Robinson's ideas continue to influence gardeners and landscape architects today—from home and cottage gardens to large estate and public gardens.
''The Wild Garden'', 1870
In ''The Wild Garden'' Robinson set forth fresh gardening principles that expanded the idea of garden and introduced themes and techniques that are taken for granted today, notably that of "naturalised" plantings. Robinson's audience were not the owners of intensely gardened suburban plots, nor dwellers in gentrified country cottages seeking a nostalgic atmosphere; nor was Robinson concerned with the immediate surroundings of the
English country house
An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...
. Robinson's wild garden brought the untidy edges, where garden blended into the larger landscape into the garden picture: meadow, water's edge, woodland edges and openings.
The hardy plants Robinson endorsed were not all natives by any means: two chapters are devoted to the hardy plants from other temperate climate zones that were appropriate to naturalising schemes. The narcissus he preferred were the small, delicate ones from the Iberian peninsula. Meadowflowers included goldenrod and asters, rampant spreaders from North America long familiar in English gardens. Nor did Robinson's 'wild' approach refer to letting gardens return to their natural state—he taught a specific gardening method and aesthetic. The nature of plants' habit of growth and their cultural preferences dictated the free design, in which human intervention was to be kept undetectable.
Without being in any sense retrograde, Robinson's book brought attention back to the plants, which had been eclipsed since the decline of "
gardenesque
The term ''gardenesque'' was introduced by John Claudius Loudon (1783–1843) in 1832 to describe a style of planting design in accordance with his 'Principle of Recognition'.
Definitions
Loudon was worried that picturesque planting could be ...
" plantings of the 1820s and 30s, during the use of tender annuals as massed colour in patterned schemes of the mid-century. The book's popularity was largely due to Robinson's promise that wild gardening could be easy and beautiful; that the use of hardy perennials would be less expensive and offer more variety than the frequent mass planting of greenhouse annuals; and that it followed nature, which he considered the source of all true design.
''The English Flower Garden'', 1883
In ''The English Flower Garden'', Robinson laid down the principles that revolutionised the art of gardening. Robinson's source of inspiration was the simple
cottage garden
The cottage garden is a distinct style that uses informal design, traditional materials, dense plantings, and a mixture of ornamental and edible plants. English in origin, it depends on grace and charm rather than grandeur and formal structure. Ho ...
, long neglected by the fashionable landscapists. In ''The English Flower Garden'' he rejected the artificial and the formal, specifically statuary,
topiary
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 w ...
,
carpet bedding, and waterworks—comparing the modern garden to "the lifeless formality of wall-paper or carpet." The straight lines and form in many gardens were seen by Robinson to "carry the dead lines of the builder into the garden." He admired nature's diversity, and promoted creepers and ramblers, smaller plantings of roses, herbaceous plants and bulbs, woodland plants, and winter flowers.
Robinson compared gardening to art, and wrote in the first chapter:
The gardener must follow the true artist, however modestly, in his respect for things as they are, in delight in natural form and beauty of flower and tree, if we are to be free from barren geometry, and if our gardens are ever to be true pictures....And as the artist's work is to see for us and preserve in pictures some of the beauty of landscape, tree, or flower, so the gardener's should be to keep for us as far as may be, in the fulness of their natural beauty, the living things themselves.
The first part of ''The English Flower Garden'' covered garden design, emphasising an approach that was individual and not stereotypical: "the best kind of garden grows out of the situation, as the primrose grows out of a cool bank."
[Massingham, p. 69.] The second part covered individual plants, hardy and half-hardy, showing artistic and natural use of each plant—with several articles included from ''The Garden'' and chapters contributed by leading gardeners of the day, including Gertrude Jekyll, who contributed the chapter on "Colour in the Flower Garden"
This book was first published in 1883, with the last edition published in 1933. During Robinson's lifetime, the book found increasing popularity, with fifteen editions during his life. For fifty years, ''The English Flower Garden'' was considered a bible by many gardeners.
[The English Garden: A Social History By Charles Quest-Ritson]
See also
*
Garden hotels
Many hotels converted from large private residences have gardens designed by famous garden designers or are particularly notable for their gardens. Alternative uses have had to be found for castles, palaces, monasteries, mansions and country seats ...
Notes
References
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*
Further reading
;By William Robinson:
*
*
* (with Rick Darke)
*
*
*,
*
*
*
*
;About William Robinson
*
*
External links
History of Horticulture website:William Robinson
*
Gravetye Manor – official website*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, William (gardener)
1838 births
1935 deaths
Fellows of the Linnean Society of London
English landscape and garden designers
English gardeners
Irish gardeners
Irish garden writers
Arts and Crafts movement artists