Country Gardens and gardening tips
The lure of a secret garden is as strong now as it was when Frances Hodgson Burnett first published The Secret Garden over a century ago. With a recent film adaptation — the fifth — having hit screens, Juliet Roberts selects a few of her favourite secret gardens.
Troy Scott-Smith, head gardener at Iford Manor, tells the tale of how the great Harold Peto found Iford and used it to his gardening and architectural dreams come to life.
Tiffany Daneff visits Painswick Rococo Garden, near Stroud, Gloucestershire, one of the best examples of a Rococo garden in this country — a place of hidden pavilions and romantic copses watched over by the god of woodland revels. Photographs by Britt Willoughby Dyer.
Informed by the Japanese ‘landscape in the garden’ tradition, the naturalistic riverside gardens of Bere Mill, Hampshire, flow with ease into their languid surroundings says Tiffany Daneff. Pictures by Andrea Jones.
James Truscott is entranced by a series of new gardens at Monteviot, near Jedburgh. that that successfully captures the magic of growing up in a place rich in history and legend. Photographs by Andrea Jones.
Among the many beautiful features in Country Life's 29 July 2020 issue — guest edited by The Princess Royal — is the article about the garden at the astonishing Ruvaal lighthouse. Getting the pictures to illustrate it proved to be something of an epic for photographer Andrea Jones.
Steven Desmond visits the early-20th-century garden created at Parcevall Hall in Skyreholme, North Yorkshire, by Sir William Milner and now triumphantly restored. Photographs by Richard Bloom.
Charles Quest-Ritson visits the National Collection of rambling roses, which shows these most romantic of plants at their very finest. Photographs by Britt Willoughby-Dyer for the Country Life Picture Library.
Kathryn Bradley-Hole looks at how the owners of Benington Lordship, near Stevenage in Hertfordshire, have taken on a renowned garden and made it work for a new generation without straining budgets or needing endless time.
Non Morris tours the Private Gardens at Petworth House, West Sussex , the home of Lord and Lady Egremont, and finds a secluded garden within the landscaped acres that’s been managed with great charm and panache. Photographs by Val Corbett.
The Old Rectory in Litton Cheney, Dorset has four acres of gardens with many and varying elements, all drawn beautifully together with the help of Arne Maynard. Christopher Stocks paid a visit; photographs by Britt Willoughby Dyer for Country Life.
As one might expect, Rosemary Alexander’s garden is packed with the lessons learned from a lifetime in horticulture, says Tilly Ware. Photographs by Mimi Connolly.
Tiffany Daneff visits Arundel Castle Gardens, sitting in the shadow of the castle and the cathedral at this beautiful West Sussex town, where head gardener Martin Duncan and his team have worked wonders with their bold and innovative plantings.
Steven Desmond looks at Gordon Castle Walled Garden at Fochabers in Morayshire, and applauds a ground-breaking restoration that balances productivity with beauty. With photographs by Britt Willoughby-Dyer.
Charles Quest-Ritson visits the best English garden on the French riviera. Photographs by Claire Takacs.
Celebrating the publication of her new book English Gardens, illustrated from the archives of Country Life, Kathryn Bradley-Hole charts the magazine’s extraordinary influence on our gardens.
Every Tuesday, we go back through the Country Life archives to enjoy an article from the past — this week, it's Clovelly Manor in Devon. Tim Longville visited for the magazine some four years ago, with Val Corbett taking the pictures.
Hidden in the Welsh valleys is The Pant, a garden of myriad sources that leaves others in the shade, says James Alexander-Sinclair. Photographs by Britt Willoughby Dyer.
Spectacular views set off varied formal elements, from pleached hornbeams to a large kitchen garden, in this serene Cotswold garden. Non Morris paid a visit; photographs by Val Corbett.
