Martina’s comments on ways of commemorating the dead bring us full circle to the Stonehenge site which has amazing burial mounds all around the surrounding countryside. Many have been ruined by the plough but as the English Heritage site above shows there are still some beautiful landforms. http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/stonehengeinteractivemap/sites/barrows/start.html
National Trust Flag flies at Charlecote
I was shocked to see the National Trust flying its flag over the Charlecote gatehouse in May 2009. Have they conquered the place? Wikipedia reports that ‘The Lucy family, who came to England with William the Conqueror, has owned the land since 1247. Charlecote Park was built in 1558 by Sir Thomas Lucy, and Queen Elizabeth I stayed in the room that is now the drawing room.’ So why can’t we have the Cross of St George flying over Charlecote? ‘White for purity and red for valour’. The colours would be better, the symbolism far better – and the pulse would beat faster. Does the National Trust associate England’s ensign with lower class football hooligans?
The River Avon, near Durrington Walls and Stonehenge, might have been as sacred as the River Ganges at Varanasi
ITV’s Timewatch broadcast a very good programme on the Stonehenge Riverside Project. Led by Mike Parker Pearson, from 2003-9, it studied the landscape setting of the monument. Parker Pearson presented the argument with brilliance, acknowledging other views and gaps in the evidence. This contrasted with other theorists (eg of Stonehenge as an astronomical observatory or a healing centre) who have seemed too partisan. As the name suggests, the Stonehenge Riverside Project theory is that the riverside was the key feature in the prehistoric landscape and that it was used for the disposal of ashes from the cremation of those who had died during the year. This gives a comparability with Varanasi and Hindu culture. Parker Pearson also argued that Durrington Walls (Britain’s largest henge circle, a few miles from Stonehenge) was ‘the land of the living’ (a settlement) while Stonehenge was ‘the land of the dead’ and that there was a processional route between them, along the River Avon. This gives a comparability with Thebes, though Egyptian processions crossed the Nile, and leads to the question (to which my answer is ‘Yes, definitely’) ‘Should Stonehenge and Durrington Walls feature in the history of garden and landscape design?’
One thought left in my mind by the programme was how much more dignified ancient funeral rites were than their modern equivalents. Britain has a ghastly collection of semi-secular-municipal-multi-faith ‘chapels’ with maudlin decor and tawdry music systems. I would much rather be cremated on an open fire and have my ashes strewn in a wild and beautiful landscape, without the taint of municipal officialdom or a level of ‘funeral parlour hucksterdom’ which makes Varanasi seem efficient, fair and well-run, as well as spectacularly beautiful and profoundly spiritual.
George Harrison of the Beatles was cremated and his ashes were cast into the Ganges.
Wildflower planting outside Kew Gardens
Kew Gardens are 250 years old this year and far more beautiful and interesting than at the time of my first visit. But if the quality is twice as good as it was, it still less than half as good as it could be. I was therefore delighted to learn that an excellent landscape architecture firm (Gross Max, of Edinburgh) has been appointed to advise on the development of Kew Gardens.
The change which has made the greatest difference, so far, is the adoption of a ‘sustainable Kew’ policy. You see this in the wildflower meadow outside the main gate (photo above, taken today) and you see it in the long grass under the trees covering perhaps 50% of the garden area. The other big changes are the restoration of old features (eg the garden of Kew Palace) and the creation of new features, including the Sackler Crossing and the Tree Walk.
The two missing elements, which Gross Max may be able to provide, are a connection with the River Thames and an overall sense of spatial composition. The latter problem is difficult, because so much of the tree and shrub planting is ‘spotty’ and the new features are being dotted about like rides in a theme park. But the problems are not insuperable and I much look forward to seeing them resolved.
One other point: the increase in quality has has been accompanied by a rise in the entry price from one penny to thirteen pounds sterling. There being 240 old pennies in an old pound, this equates (see comment below) to an increase of three thousand one hundred and twenty percent. Kew will be a very great garden when the visual quality has risen proportionately!
Kenilworth Elizabethan Castle Garden
It is not beautiful. This is the main problem with the Kenilworth Castle garden restoration. They should have put a talented garden designer in charge of the project, with instructions to listen to the historical experts and be sure to produce a beautiful result. Tudor craftsmanship was excellent. This project looks as though it belongs in an upscale garden centre near the M25. The aviary is too big. The fence is too low. The obelisks are too high. The lawn-fringed paths are a total historical anachronism. The elements of the composition are out of scale with each other. It does not have the charm of a medieval garden or the dignity of a renaissance garden. It is a codge-up.
Press coverage of this significant garden restoration has concentrated on the cost (£2.1m). I disagree: if anything the budget was too low for a worthwhile project, justified by (1) an archaeological investigation which found the base of the original marble fountain (2) the remarkably detailed description in the Robert Langham Letter, describing Queen Elizabeth I’s visit to Kenilworth Castle in 1575. An excerpt from this letter is quoted below. I worry about Simon Thurley’s garden judgement with regard to gardens. He made a similar mistake with the restoration of the Privy Garden at Hampton Court. There many other things which could have been done with the money – and I would rather have seen a re-creation of a medieval castle garden. We have enough Tudor re-creations from the BBC without EH jumping on this bandwagon – they must be wondering how they could manage some Jane Austen re-creations. If EH thought renaissance gardens looked like this, they should visit Italy and France.
An excerpt from Robert Langham’s letter about Queen Elizabeth I’s visit to Kenilworth Castle in 1575: “Along the castle wall is reared a pleasant terrace of a ten foot high and a twelve broad, even underfoot and fresh of fine grass, as is also the side thereof toward the garden, in which, by sundry equal distances, with obelisks, spheres and white bears all of stone upon their curious bases by good show were set; to these, two fine arbours redolent by sweet trees and flowers, at each end one…. Then, much graced by due proportion of four even quarters, in the midst of each upon a base a two foot square and high, seemly bordered of itself, a square pilaster rising pyramidally of a fifteen foot high, symmetrically pierced through from a foot beneath until a two foot from the top, whereupon, for a capital, an orb of a ten inches thick…Redolent plants and fragrant herbs and flowers, in form, colour and quantity so deliciously variant, and fruit-trees bedecked with their apples, pears and ripe cherries. And unto these in the midst against the terrace a square cage, sumptuous and beautiful, joined hard to the north wall…. In the centre (as it were) of this goodly garden was there placed a very fair fountain, cast into an eight-square, reared a four foot high, from the midst whereof a column up set in shape of two atlantes joined together a back-half, the one looking east, the other west, with their hands upholding a fair-formed bowl of a three foot over, from whence sundry fine pipes did lively distil continual streams into the receipt of the fountain”
In March 2009 the Gardenvisit.com World Garden Finder:
But we want to make it better! Please help us – with reviews, ratings, photographs and descriptions.
The original idea for the garden finder was to provide links to gardens from my online book English garden design: history, philosophy and styles since 1650. [This book also appeared in print, in 1986 and is due to be revised and re-published]. Since 1998 we have published over 25 online books and there is an interesting job to be done in linking them to and from the garden finder descriptions.
