A visit to David Austin's private garden

I've already written about my Garden Media Guild trip to the David Austin Roses in Shropshire, and I really was delighted by the gardens there and beguiled by certain roses.

 

But after a delicious lunch and gossip with other guild members (we talk a lot) it was time for another treat.....a look around David Austin's private garden surrounding his home.

 

There's always something so inviting about a gate ajar and a glimpse through to what lies beyond





 

From the back of the house your eye alights first on the water and then the statue in the distance draws you deep into the garden.

Like all good gardens, you can't see everything all at once,  you must seek and then you shall find...

While we were walking around , David Austin came into the garden to meet us...

and it was a pleasure to meet him. This after all is the man who has created over 200 English roses and developed  the National Collection of roses here. A man who developed his boyhood  passion to a business with three generations of his family working as world leaders when it comes to rose breeding. What a legacy...

As you would expect there were plenty of roses in his own private garden...and Constance Craig Smith, who organised our trip, was busy photographing just a few of them.

Making my way around the garden towards the front of the house,  I slipped through here

and found this charming piece, sculpted by David's late wife Pat

and then found two peacocks strutting their stuff

 before making my way back to the water lilies

and to wander around the roses one last time.

 

 

 A magical afternoon.....
 

A day of roses, cockleshells and the sea

I visited a rose garden the other week. Late October isn't the ideal time of year to do this of course. The sheer headiness and intoxication you get from inhaling the scents of  scores of rose bushes was sadly lacking.



There again, I hadn't planned this visit to the Southsea  Rose Garden. My daughter, husband and I were walking our three dogs along the beachfront on a sunny Monday morning....

 

 

that was when my daughter said the magic words "rose garden", and there was a sudden detour to the rose garden.



 

Actually, it's the ideal time of the year to see the bones of a garden.

I liked the simple design, the weathered brick , the trellises,  the clean lines of the paths and the fact that there were lots of benches to sit down in different parts of the garden.

Of course at the end of October, you expect patches of brown earth, and true, many of the roses were had lost their blossom, but there was still enough colour to gladden my heart.

 

I do like this ruby wedding rose even if it only has a faint fragrance 

 

 



This beauty, which I don't know the name of, was a vision of pastel prettiness...and its scent was just as subtle.

It's not a huge rose garden, but it's a perfect place to sit and ponder, away from the harsh winds of the sea front and the noise of the cars, to just relax.



But there's so much more to the site of this rose garden. It was previously an eighteenth century fortification called Lumps Fort. After a chequered history, in World War II, this area was used as a training base for the Royal Marine Boom Patrol Detachment.



 Have you ever heard of the Cockleshell Heroes? It's the title of a film made in 1955, which honoured the incredible bravery and fortitude of the men who trained here before launching a raid by canoe, on the harbour in Bordeaux a mere thirteen years earlier. They were an elite squad housed in two nissen huts , and trained for their mission in the Solent a few yards away.



The raid was called Operation Frankton, and back in those days Bordeaux was a key port for the Germans. The mission for the men was to attack all the cargo ships  which kept the German army supplied after paddling into the harbour by canoe.



Five canoes and ten men managed to not only sink one ship and badly damage four others with limpet mines, but they succeeded in curtailing the use of the harbour for months. Can you imagine what it must have been like to be taken to France by submarine, then sailing into a heavily guarded German occupied port in the depths of December?



Such a daring plan, but it was one which cost eight of the men their lives. Six were executed by the Germans and two died from hypothermia. Major Hasler and Bill Sparkes were the only two to survive.

 

It's said that Winston Churchill believed that their mission shortened the duration of World War II by six months. What a feat of courage, and how wonderful that this site wasn't built on in the post war frenzy of building.



I love the fact that this small rose garden, just a minute away from the rush of modern life, has been created as a place of tranquillity, of quiet beauty, where we can remember those heroes of World War  II.

 

A day out at Gardeners' World Live

Summer is whizzing by so quickly...and I've already missed certain gardening events that I really would have liked to go to. I wasn't able to go to the Chelsea Flower Show this year, and I had withdrawal symptoms, especially after having such a wonderful time  there last year ( see what I got up to last year  here http://thinkingofthedays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/day-at-chelsea-flower-show-part-2.html  and here http://thinkingofthedays.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/day-out-at-chelsea-chelsea-flower-show.html)

I've not even been to visit any Open gardens either, so I've been in dire need of some botanical inspiration , I had a definite desire to see other people's creativity brought to life, and I rather fancied doing a little shopping.

So, would this fit the bill?

Well yes it did.....there were a number of show gardens which were competing to be as innovative as they could be using a set list of materials. "Metamorphosis " was the theme, which was interpreted in interesting ways.

There were also some funky gardens

But as time was running short, I made a beeline for the RHS Floral Marquee where I could admire the rows of beautiful plants and flowers from around a hundred nurseries...

It was very muggy in the marquee...I began to flag, and decided I needed some fresh air....but then I saw the David Austin  roses display stand. It called me like a siren and I came closer, the most delicious fragrance wafted along in the still air. Gertrude Jekyll is my favourite rose....yet I still don't have one in my garden. This must be remedied!

Mind you I was so taken with this eglantine rose too...so prettily perfect too with such a delicate scent...I've decided that I must make the trip upto David Austin in Shropshire to see more.

There was lots to admire at Gardeners' World Live outside, but going indoors into the main halls didn't fill me with the same enthusiasm ...overall, there seemed a lack of vitality and pazazz, a cohesiveness and staff on a number of stands looked, quite frankly, bored.

What did interest me was the bonsai exhibition

Precision and perfection everywhere....

 

Not that you'll ever see me carefully shaping something like this. Firstly, putting a pair of scissors or secateurs in my hands is a high risk strategy...and secondly  I simply don't have the patience....although I did appreciate what I saw so much.

My first visit to Gardeners' World Live was all too brief....but will I go next year? Yes I will..... I met some lovely people, especially the persuasive lot on the RHS stand touting for new blood! As for the shopping, I've got a fair few ideas, but in the end I didn't buy anything on the day - unlike others on the bus back to the car park, who were poking other passengers with their purchases and plants. Thank goodness I didn't buy my Gertude Jekyll rose...that could have been interesting....

Today's track is my favourite piece of choral music "Oh Spotless Rose". Every time I hear it, I'm lost in the beauty of the composition and the incredible sounds that voices can make. This version is by the King's College Choir in Cambridge. It's for my friends Shannon Hurst lane, Denise Dube and Susan Lanier Graham from across the pond.....on a cold February afternoon  I took them to Evensong at Kings College, something they said they would never forget.

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