The Gardens Trust presents a series of three talks on botanists and botanical art across three centuries, exploring people and illustrations that have defined, recorded and celebrated the world of plants in all their distinctiveness and intricacy. We start the series with exciting new research on previously unremarked botanical images on the paneling of a fine Jacobean house in Hampshire. In the second lecture we will examine the extraordinary set of almost a thousand paper collages of exotic plants produced by an 18th century woman of advanced years, before finishing with tales of a Victorian lady traveler who sought out rare plants in their native lands, not to collect – but to paint. Tickets for the three part series may be purchased through Eventbrite at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/botanists-and-botanical-art-tickets-834657221217Attendees will be sent a Zoom link 2 days (and again a few hours) prior to the start of the first talk (If you do not receive this link please contact us), and a link to the recorded session will be sent shortly after each session and will be available for 1 week.
On May 21, Anne Benson will speak on Early Botanists and the Botanical Paintings at Bramshill, Hampshire. Bramshill House in north-east Hampshire is one of the largest, surviving Jacobean mansions in England. What is seen today is mostly the work commissioned by Edward, 11th Baron Zouche of Harringworth (1556̶ 1665), from between 1605 and 1625. The Grade 1-listed gardens and parkland also contain features from the Jacobean period including walled gardens, avenues and the destination gardens of a maze and a lake with a man-made island. This talk first presents these features and then continues with Ann’s recent research on the botanical images painted on the panelling of a first-floor room in the north-west wing of the house. Previously rarely referenced and under-researched, these surviving botanical paintings are shown to be of international significance in terms of their date of creation, botanical detail, state of preservation and through Bramshill’s historic owners, for associations with the early botanists and horticulturalists of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries.
Dr Anne Benson FSA FRHistS is a garden historian specializing in the Tudor and Stuart periods. She is best known for her multidisciplinary research on the ancestral homes of the Dukes of Beaufort, namely Troy House and Raglan Castle, Monmouthshire and on the Jacobean Bramshill estate, Hampshire. Leverhulme Emeritus Fellowship funding enabled Ann to research the garden history of Cambridge colleges founded in medieval and Tudor times. Subsequently, she was awarded a Beaufort Fellowship at St John’s College, Cambridge. Ann is a former teacher, director of university post-graduate courses, Arts Society lecturer and Cabinet Office consultant. She continues to lecture for national bodies on garden history research.
Five fabulous gardens will be featured by the Garden Conservancy on May 11 in Massachusetts. For complete information visit www.gardenconservancy.org.
In Worcester, visit the garden of Matt Mattus and Joe Philip. Matt’s garden is a mature, third- generation family property in a suburban neighborhood. It contains many tall trees (now more than 90 feet tall) planted in the 1920s by his grandfather and father. “The garden is an ongoing restoration project” says Matt. “I’ve never opened it up for tours as I’ve always believed that it was more of a small collector’s garden than one that is ‘tour-worthy’, yet I know that most visitors enjoy the casual atmosphere, and the ‘down the rabbit hole-ness’ of a true collector’s garden!” Expect to see collections of interesting plants and greenhouse projects, sweet peas, stone and gravel paths, boxwood and hornbeam hedges, garden rooms, and even a small 100-year-old goldfish pond. Charming and picturesque as a small English garden and as horticulturally interesting as a botanic garden, this 1.5 acres is essentially a home garden, yet one that has recently been featured in Martha Stewart Living, Better Homes and Gardens, and other magazines. Matt Mattus, whose blog is Growingwithplants.com, is the author of Mastering the Art of Vegetable Gardening (2019) and Mastering the Art of Growing Flowers (2020).
Petersham is the location of an organic, toxin-free, dry/xeriscape garden called Swift River Farm. When Bruce and Gus acquired this 87-acre property in north central Massachusetts in 1998, there wasn’t even the hint of a garden to be seen. Over the next few years, an orchard of heirloom apple varieties was planted, stone walls built, and the first of several perennial gardens was installed. A woodland garden filled with spring ephemerals, epimediums, hellebores, mukdenia, hostas, and small flowering trees and shrubs now stretches from the front of the house down along the north side of the property to a bed of tree peonies. There is also a large rock garden, a spring garden with primulas, and spring bulbs. In 2010, Gordon Hayward created a master plan designed to unite the gardens, adding a water garden, a large pollinator meadow garden, an oak walk, and gravel paths allowing easy access between different areas. Since 2012 Helen O’Donnell, garden designer and plantswoman extraordinaire, has been consulting on planting design and new garden projects.
The Berry Garden in Boylston began as an open hayfield in 2001, and everything in the garden was planted by the owners. What was once a hayfield has become a wonderful garden with a great diversity of well-cultivated plants. So much time and energy has been lavished on it that it has the feel of an established garden. Many layers lead the visitor past a marvelous array of trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants. The owners’ great passion for plants is infectious. Parts of the garden are still evolving. This garden’s estimated size is 2 acres.
A larger site is the garden of Pepe and John Maynard in Groton. In their words: Our place, currently about 25 acres, was originally part of a much larger property, most of which was placed under conservation in 2006. We were attracted to it by the sweeping views to the west, dramatic sunsets, and the protection offered by hundreds of acres of surrounding fields and woodland, all protected from development. Starting in the nineteenth century, successive large country houses had been built on the site, surrounded by the formal, high-maintenance gardens of the day. The last of these rather grand houses was demolished in the 1960s. The succeeding generation of the previous owning family was more interested in breeding Black Angus than in horticulture. As a result the formal gardens had succumbed to neglect, bittersweet, and browsing deer by the time we purchased the property in 2007. At that time we had no interest in restoring formal gardens. Our first steps were to plant an allée of small sugar maples along the lane leading to our barn, and to fence a small nursery area where we could stockpile plants and grow them safe from deer. We dithered about building a deer fence around more of the property, fearing it would interfere with the view, but finally fenced about 15 acres. The fence enabled us to begin planting to create informal, naturalistic grounds using native plant material as much as possible. While the nursery is now empty and the maples in the allée have reached 12 inches in diameter, all the plantings are still young and have only begun to mature. Nonetheless we believe the grounds have grown in enough to reward unhurried exploration with a wide variety of trees and shrubs, and, in the spring, extensive plantings of daffodils and other bulbs. The surrounding areas under conservation are open for walks, and a few remaining Black Angus add interest to the landscape. In the summer of 2020 an energetic couple working for us decided to clear out a small formal garden neglected for 25 years and overgrown to the point of invisibility. An exceptional stonemason rebuilt the dry stone walls over the winter and we began replanting in the early summer of 2021. An exceptionally wet summer helped to get new perennials established.This garden’s estimated size is 10 acres. Please note this garden will be open until 6 pm.
The Kinsey-Pope Garden is open three times a year, in Amherst, Massachusetts. It is a landscape of many uncommon trees with strikingly beautiful bark and a wide variety of textures, flowers, berries, and great autumn color; many shrubs with more than one season of beauty; perennials flowering in three seasons; ground covers of unusual dramatic effect covering all beds during all seasons; and in winter offering a wide palette of interesting shapes, lovely bark, and many evergreen trees and shrubs. In addition, there are three bridges over a stone-lined swale, a hand-built screened gazebo and curved top arbor, a charming little pond, many benches and Japanese stone lanterns, large-stone walkways and stone walls, and a Japanese inspired fence surrounding all of the ½-acre garden. Admission will be in two sessions, 10 – 1 and 1 – 5.
Yale Educational Travel announces an exclusive trip, Gracious Gardens & Architectural Gems of London, Sussex & Hampshire, featuring Yale Faculty Linda Peterson and Fred Strebeigh, May 22 to May 31. This unforgettable journey through the English countryside in late spring, when glorious gardens are in full bloom, will provide a privileged look at great houses built by the English aristocracy – many carefully restored by the families who live there. You will, by special arrangement, attend the celebrated Chelsea Flower Show on Members’ Day, a visit to Down House, where Charles Darwin worked on his scientific theories and wrote On the Origin of Species, and 17th century Bateman’s, home to Rudyard Kipling from 1902 – 1936.. Then, travel south to East Sussex, including a visit to Scotney Castle, whose gardens are renowned for spectacular displays of rhododendrons and azaleas. In Hampshire, you will stop en route at Petworth House, a late 17th century mansion housing a fine collection of works by Turner and Van Dyck. You will also visit Firle Place, an intriguing mix of Tudor and Georgian style, and Highclere Castle, a Victorian home in high Elizabethan style, with a park designed by Capability Brown, and Osborne House (below) on the Isle of Wight. $6,995 per person, double occupancy, with a single supplement of $1,125. For a brochure and complete information, call 203-432-1952, or make a reservation on line at www.YaleEdTravel.org/england11.
