Wordless Wednesday 28/7/10 – Day Lily

Update on my display area

I thought I would entertain you while I am away with an update on one of the projects we completed in the garden this year.  I wrote here about how my eldest had constructed a raised planting display area for me at the end of the patio out of some breeze blocks and scaffolding board.  I initially used the area for hardening off seedlings etc but now these have been planted out I am using it for all my tender plants which are enjoying a holiday from the greenhouse.  I am really pleased with the area as it has fully lived up to my expectations.  I am wondering whether I can tack some horticultural fleece to the fence behind the shelving to drape over plants stored here in the winter – just an idea which I will ponder further.

Kiftsgate Revisted

Last week I wrote about visiting Hidcote Gardens in the Cotswolds with Victoria.  We also visited Kiftsgate Gardens – they are only over the road, well a 5 minute walk from each other.

Both gardens are high up on the Cotswold hills and consequently have far reaching views across the surrounding countryside. However, there is one striking difference whilst Hidcote uses the borrowed landscape with views along vistas to the surrounding countryside, Kiftsgate’s situation is far more dramatic.  Perched on top of the escarpment the house has an imposing position and looks very dramatic when viewed from the Lower Pond area.

I had visited Kiftsgate some years ago and loved it.  However, Victoria had not been before so wasn’t prepared for the steep sloping path down to the Lower Pond area.  I seem to remember the path being longer and more zig-zaggy on my previous visit but that is probably because I knew what to expect this time and was distracted by Victoria’s amazement at the drop.  I have to say that I would have planted the slope differently.  There are lots of shrubs etc but I would use lots of broad leaf plants to make the path feel more enclosed and then maybe some gaps so the view comes as a surprise.

When you get to the Lower Pond area it is amazing to look back up and see how drastic the drop from the house is (you can just see the houe in the top of the picture above)). There is a lovely Arts and Crafts summer house and half moon shaped swimming pool which was put in by the owners mother.  I thought it looked different from when I last visited and the website says that the pool was painted black a few years ago and I think it makes the pool look very smart and up to date.  We did comment that the location of the pool was really wonderful and if it was being built today no doubt it would be one of those infinity pools since the location lends itself beautifully to this.

After the slog back up the slope you enter the gardens created by the owners grandmother, who was a friend of Major Johnson of Hidcote.  As per Hidcote the garden is made up of a number of rooms each divided with the use of hedges.  However, it is on a much smaller scale than Hidcote.  The whole garden felt more intimate and friendly than Hidcote and I think that this is because the garden is still gardened by the creator’s family who live in the house as opposed to Hidcote where the garden is maintained by a team of gardeners.  I think there is more atmosphere at Kiftsgate despite the number of visitors which increased drastically at one point with the arrival of several coach loads of Japanese tourists.

The area which fascinated us most, as well as the slope, was the newish water garden.  This area was formally the tennis court and is surrounded by mature yew hedges.  There is a sculpture at the far end comprising of 20 gilded brozen philodendron leaves. The sculpture is a water sculpture and periodically turns into a fountain which is quite nice.  The pool is black and I presume they use that black dye in it as well.  It is quite stark but also quite effective and I found sitting there very restful.  I expect this was due to the combination of the high hedges blocking out any distractions and the limited colour palette of the water garden.

As ever we completed our garden visit with a cream tea which was very enjoyable and rounded off our Cotswold outing nicely.

I’m off now to Italy for a week but no doubt will bore you at length when I return with my holiday pics!!

Wordless Wednesday 21/7/2010 – Rain Splashed Peony

No more procrastination

Dicentra scandens grown from seed this year

I have had the last week off as annual leave and its been a real mixed week emotionally, but as I face the prospect of going back to work tomorrow I think the break has done me a power of good.

As ever I had ridiculously unrealistic plans for the week and luckily the rain which we had for most of the week curtailed some of those plans or I would have really run myself into the ground.  The week started with a visit to Hidcote and Kiftsgate Gardens in the Cotswolds with Victoria.  I wrote about the trip to Hidcote here and will write about Kiftsgate soon – promise. We had a great day though I found myself wondering whether visiting two gardens in one day is such a good idea.  It’s not so much physical demands but more trying to differentiate between the impressions left by the two gardens in my mind days later.

Tuesday brought a routine visit to the doctors which has resulted in me having to have a fasting blood test first thing tomorrow morning so no more food or drink for me until tomorrow  so this post might be rather long as a distraction.  The blood test is only precautionary to make sure there isn’t any medical reason for my continued tiredness which both the doctor and I suspect is due to me trying to come to terms with losing my sister last October. Not  having experienced grief before I have been overwhelmed by the extreme ping-pong effect on my emotions and the tiredness I feel.  However, a  positive thing to come out of losing Claire is that my attitude to life has changed,  this is not always a good thing as I tended to say what I thought before and this has probably got worse, but I do find myself thinking more and more that life is just too short so what the heck.  Instead of procrastinating about studying for the RHS certificates and finding 101 reasons why I shouldn’t do it I have just signed up for the  course.

Consequently, as part of the arduous process that seems to be involved with signing up for this course at the local horticultural college Wednesday found me on a taster day.  We were a disparate group: 4 teenage boys (1 a real goth), 2 chaps in their late 20s,  a 30 something lady who was into organics and community gardening, a lady in her 50s who wanted to take up garden design, and me.  It turned out that the taster day was for anyone interested in any course to do with horticulture, landscaping etc.  The morning was spent learning to take cuttings and potting up a decorative pot – not really challenging and then after lunch we were to do hard landscaping.  I have to say that my heart sank at the prospect but not as much as it would have done a year ago.  We were presented with some paving and told to have a go at laying it.  We worked in pairs (I worked with the 50-year-old lady who was also called Helen).  It turned out that all  the lads were interested in hard landscaping courses so this was right up their street.  Helen and I decided that we would just go for it and do our best in a corner out-of-the-way.  Turned out we were fab, every  slab was level first time – even our tutor was impressed and we out did the la!ds  We had such a laugh that I think we were bordering on hysteria.  Found myself seriously considering taking up hard landscaping – well for about  an hour!.

Thursday and the weather was rubbish – rain and more rain.  It was one of those days to address  jobs you have avoided so I did all my paperwork which did in the end leave me feeling quite pleased with myself.  On a positive note I confirmed the arrangements for a visit to Highgrove Gardens with a bunch of garden twitters (you know who you are).  It had taken less than a week from a casual wouldn’t it be nice to conversation on twitter to making the booking – more of my new grab life while you can attitude.

The week deteriorated after this due to reading that one of the US blotanists had lost her 21-year-old daughter in a car accident.  Not surprisingly this brought emotions to the surface which was challenging.  The remedy was to get my parents around for what the Americans call a work party.  We tidied the front garden, my least favourite part of the  garden, weeded the driveway and the patio and generally had a really good tidy up of the garden.  As I worked with my Mum we talked about my sister and her family which was good.  We also decided that we couldn’t face another Christmas like last year and that as Christmas would never be the same again we should do something completely different this year.  So I now have the task of finding a holiday cottage for us for this Christmas – just what I need, a project to get my teeth in to.

Finally, feeling recharged, today I set to in the garden and decided that enough was enough.  As some readers will know I am addicted to growing things from seed and then struggle to find homes for the plants I grow.  I am getting better at only pricking out a few of each batch but I do have quite a lot of young plants from seeds sown last year and the year before which were still sitting in pots looking neglected.  So today  I planted all of them – every single one.  I have about 20 Dierama which I have planted in a big block  in the raised bed at the top of the  garden along with lots of grass seedlings.  Who know what the  result will look like in a year’s time but I don’t care – I can always move things around and you never know my gung-ho attitude may have some good outcomes.

So that’s me all recharged emotional and physically and with projects identified to give me something to focus on for the next couple of months until my course  starts. Three days back at work and then we are off to Sorrento in Italy for a week I can’t wait.

Not all natural products smell nice

This month’s review parcel from My Pure contained A’kin Hair Care Jojoba & Lavender Conditioner and Lovea Tahitian Monoi Moisturiser.

Last month I had had products from both these companies. I was excited at receiving another A’kin product but slightly dubious about the Lovea product, having not liked their shampoo last time but as it was a moisturiser I had an open mind. I use a lot of moisturiser and body lotion so it was nice to have some free to try out.  The package was in the form of a white plastic bottle with a pump-action top which seemed to me to be a good idea as it avoids you accidentally pouring far too much out in one go – something I have done before now much to my annoyance.  The Lovea Tahitian Monoi moisturiser has a nice feel to it, it’s not too wet or sticky and is absorbed into the skin quickly, which means you don’t have to stand around waiting for your hands or body to dry before you get dressed or do whatever.  However, I really didn’t like the smell of the moisturiser which was such a disappointment.  I was surprised at how important this was to me.  Naturally being moisturiser which is  affected by your body heat the smell of the product lingers  and this is not  great when you really don’t like the smell.  I have been trying to come up with words to describe the smell but have struggled.  It isn’t  a floral smell but has an oily overtone.  The main ingredient in the product is Monoi which I had never heard of.  The description of this from the web-site is “Monoi is a natural ingredient obtained by soaking Tiaré flowers in copra oil, which is extracted from ripe coconuts harvested in French Polynesia” and I suspect  that it is the copra oil I can smell.  On the plus side though my youngest son, 17, was quite happy to use the moisturiser on his tanned arms, maybe because  it doesn’t smell flowery it is acceptable!

The second product the A’kin Hair Care Jojoba & Lavender Conditioner really appealed to me.  I loved the smell which lingered in my hair for some time.  Lavender for me is always a nice fresh smell and I think this is enriched by the Jojoba.  The label on the bottle claims that the product will provide light conditioning and natural lustre whilst improving the vigour of my hair and scalp.  It claims “Your hair will have body, be silky soft, shiny and manageable.”  Now I have very thick hair so I don’t want any more body!!  I said last month when reviewing a shampoo that I often find hair care products leave a sticky residue on my hair so I was a little apprehensive to be trying a conditioner.  However, everything about the product was right.  My hair was nice and shiny and soft after conditioning and there was no sticky residue.  As well as a great product I loved the packaging.  The bottle is dark green with a simple label which includes a faint  botanical drawing of jojoba and information about the products claims.  The lavender used is certified as organic and the jojoba is ‘cold pressed Australian jojoba’; I’m not sure what that means but I do know that cold pressed olive oil is  meant to be the best so I suspect  the same applies in this  case.  All in all I would happily use this product again.

It seems that I am becoming a convert to A’kin products!

A Soggy GBBD – July 2010

This month we have a rather bedraggled Garden Bloggers Bloom Day.  We haven’t had any rain for at least 5 weeks but this week it has been making up for it, probably as I have this week off as annual leave. So you will need to forgive the soggy looking flowers in the pictures.  Above is Lilium LA Landini – a new purchase this year along with Lilium LA Eyeliner which I showed you here.

Another new arrival in the garden is this Francoa sonchifolia Rogerson’s form.  I haven’t decided completely where in the garden they will go as I was waiting for the flowers to open but I have more of an idea now.  I love this plant as it has large leaves which will contrast with the more fragile plants and lots of long tall stamens of flowers.

Bringing some heat to the garden is this Lychnis arkwrightii – I have about 6 of these plants grown from seed this year.  I have just been waiting for some rain to moisten the soil before I plant them out but they will be going out hopefully this afternoon and form a small sweep up the bank.

But the new flower that really has me excited this year is this  Cautleya spicata ‘Arun Flame’ which I bought from Crug Farm last September. I was worried I would loose it during the horrid winter we had this year but no it is flowering away nicely on the patio, the first of my new exotic collection!.

Yet another newbie in the garden which I am rather taken with is this gladiolus.  I can’t find the label at the moment but it is one of the smaller gladiolus as opposed to the big blowsy ones.

So those are the new arrivals in the garden that are flowering at the moment.  There is lots more in flower although it does look a little wet at the moment.  I thought I would put some pics of other plants that are looking good at the moment into a slide show.  These are not that different to what was in flower this time last year.

To see what is flowering in other gardens around the world visit Carol at May Dreams blog

Hidcote Gardens

Yesterday I popped over to the Cotswolds for a bit of garden visiting with Victoria.  We had  decided to visit Hidcote Gardens and Kiftsgate gardens (they are only 10 mins walk from each other).  First up was Hidcote Gardens, which is a National Trust property, in fact Hidcote is the first garden that the National Trust took on.

As this garden was developed at the same time as Bryan’s Ground (see previous post) it is hardly surprising that it too was developed around the Arts and Craft’s garden room style.  Whilst I loved Bryan’s  Ground I struggled with Hidcote Gardens as beautiful as they are. You cannot fault the planting or the maintenance of the gardens, in fact we saw a whole team of volunteers deadheading rhododendrons and the 4.5 miles of hedges were immaculate but for me there was something lacking.

The Old Garden was full of herbaceous perennials.  It was nice to see the white form of Astrantia, which I have, instead of the dark red ones that seems to be more popular in gardens. It worked well with the other pale perennials and roses.  I was impressed with how tall some of the perennials were, particularly the Campanulas, and the apparent lack of much staking.

The famous Red Borders were just beginning to come into their own; full of red Dahlias, Castor Oil Plants, Day Lilies etc but for me whilst it was impressive to look at in the sense that it was very well executed it didn’t have the impact that I had experienced at Bryan’s Ground.  I find the tall hedges quite oppressive and in some areas almost suffocating this is probably because I am one of those people who prefers wide open spaces.  However, I think in some parts of the garden the hedges dominated the planting too much and I found myself wondering whether they were as tall in Johnson’s time.  I  particularly didn’t like the Fuchsia  Garden, I think there wasn’t enough contrast between the foliage of the hedges and parterres and the Fuchsia.

The Fuchsia Garden

However, there were two areas that I find quite interesting and inspiring.  The first was the Rose Walk which is a fairly new development. The Walk comprises of two borders planted up with old French Roses, day lilies, phlox, penstemons and sage.  In some ways the planting here was similar to other parts of the garden but for me it was more naturalistic, there was no rigid formality, no hedges. As you can see from the photo below there are clipped yews through the borders and I think in this instance it helps the movement of the border giving it a rhythm. The borders had a certain informality around them to the extent that we spotted a courgette plant weaving its way through the plants – whether this was intentional or an escapee from the neighbour veg garden I don’t know but it added to its charm.

The Rose Walk

However, the area that filled me with lots of enthusiasm, which is now even more apparent due to the number of photos I took of it, was Mrs Winthrop’s Garden.  A celebration of blue and yellow in honour of Lawrence’s mother who apparently liked these colours.  What interested me was the combination of plants we consider everyday such as Alchemilla Mollis, of which there was masses, and more exotic plants such as the yuccas and the Chusan Palm.  There was also an interesting play of heights and a move away from the traditional borders – in this case the paths felt as though they were going into the borders.  Height was created through obelisks of golden hop which, for me, was an interesting contrast to the surrounding hedges.  The space did not feel so closed in, it felt much more open and airy which is far more to my taste. This was the only area where I found myself looking carefully at the planting to see how the effects were achieved and what was being used.

Mrs Winthrop's Garden

We were told by one of the guides that hardly any information was available on the garden when Lawrence died and that they have spent a lot of time trying to put together information from various photographs etc. So I found myself wondering how much of the planting, in any of the areas, was based on Lawrence’s original planting and how much was the influence of the Head Gardener.  I felt that Mrs Winthrop’s Garden may be more the Head Gardener’s influence though that is speculation on my part.  My reason being that this area had an atmosphere and I find myself feeling more and more that gardens that are maintained by their owners for their own benefit have more of an atmosphere, and in some excellent cases a soul, than those gardens that are maintained by a team of gardeners for the public to see.

Post on Kiftsgate to follow in a couple of days.

A Juxtaposition between Man and Nature

There are times in life when you find yourself transported back to an earlier experience  either by a smell, sight or sound.  Today was one of those days.

Bryan’s Ground in Herefordshire, right on the Welsh border, is the garden of the creators of Hortus. It nestles in the rolling countryside just above Presteigne overlooking water meadows towards, I believe, the Welsh Black Mountains.  In my last post I wrote about the ‘gardens as art’ debate and how for me to be Art I need to experience an emotional or intellectual response to something be it paintings, sculpture, literature or indeed gardens.  Bizarrely two days later that is exactly what has happened.  I even experienced a quickening of my heart beat at one point when going round a corner to be presented with another sumptuous planting. The peace, serenity, awe and connection to nature I experienced took me right back to being a teenager when I used to walk our dog in the peaceful beech woods near my home.

The house was built back in 1912, at the end of the Arts and Crafts movement and this is very apparent in its style, it is believed that the architects, a local firm, were also responsible for some of the landscaping.  As with many of the other great gardens being developed around this time, such as Hidcote and Sissinghurst, the garden was developed in a series of rooms, one leading from another.  Generally my experience is that I really don’t like this style of garden, I find them oppressive with their high clipped hedges but at Bryan’s Ground you don’t experience lots of hedges, they are more unobtrusive. I am also not a fan of topiary especially on mass, for me it just appears dead, there is no movement.I did experience this in one part of the garden – the Green Theatre Stage but then I suppose if its to be used as a stage you wouldn’t want anything to distract your attention.

There were only two other visitors when I arrived and I went in the opposite direction to them so I got to enjoy the feeling of having the garden to myself.  I had that rare experience, for me, of wanting to just sit and soak in the atmosphere.  What really struck me was the juxtapositioning of controlled and wild. A couple of the garden rooms had box parterres with plants billowing out from the centre; the contrast between the neat box and the exuberance of the fennel and day lilies, in the case of the sunken pond garden, made me think of contrast between man-made and nature.

There are 3 square garden rooms where the majority of the herbaceous planting is.  Now some of my gardening friends would have been very dismissive about this planting.  Not because of the quality of the plants or their combination but because there was much dead heading required, weeds apparent both in the borders and paths, and plants billowing out of control over the paths to the point where you occasionally had to step over them.  Personally, this was what made the garden for me.  This was not a neglected garden far from it but given its size (3 acres of formal garden) and the unremitting dry weather we have had for about 6 weeks it is hardly surprising that everything is not just so.  But then I found myself thinking why should it be.  Why should all the plants be tied back off the paths, why does it matter that there are seed heads everywhere? Would the garden look so much better if it was gardened by a group of gardeners with every weed removed as soon as it showed itself.  I think not. I believe that this would destroy the sole of this garden where its creators have achieved a wonderful mix of control and exuberance.  It is a real garden, its owners’ garden not a garden that exists to amuse the public  on a daily basis.

Due to an element of disarray in this part of the  garden there is a certain sensuality about it.  I expect that if  I had visited a month ago when the roses were just coming out and other herbaceous plants were coming into bloom I would have described it as romantic but now with the overpowering scent of many roses in the air there is a certain wantonness about the place.  It was certainly a heady mix.  It  is clear that there is an artist’s eye behind the creation of this garden.  You can see it in the way the colours of flowers blend but especially in the clever use of vistas and focal points.

Just like a good artist does when they lead your eye into a drawing or painting, the artist behind this garden leads you forward towards another view, another surprise.  There is a clever play of light and dark; moving from areas of deep shade as in the George Walk (pic 2) to the brightness of the sunken garden (top pic).  But this is not a garden devoted to horticulture or intelleculising things there is humour everywhere.  Small collections of bits  and pieces ranging from old tools, through strange metal curios, to a wonderful collection of gargoyles perched on top of a wall.  Personally there were probably too many of these curios for me but they do provide an interesting juxtaposition of man made against nature again.

From the garden you move into the arboretum which is approximately 5 acres.  This was started in 2000 (the owners having taken on the property in 1993).  I have always found it hard to be enthusiastic about arboretums and generally avoid them apart from maybe to admire the autumn colour but this arboretum was different.  Instead of neat grassland the trees were planted in a meadow.  While I was having my cake and admiring the view later I picked up a back copy of Hortus from 2003 (I think) and was interested to read the editor’s piece where David Wheeler, one of the owners of Bryan’s Ground, describes visiting a garden where there was a heavy use of grasses and how fascinated he was with this.  I think this is reflected in the arboretum and also to an extent in some of the formal garden.   The grasses give movement to the arboretum and bring life to it. The air is full of the sound of crickets and bird song and butterflies flitted everywhere.

As with the formal garden there is a play between control and wild with paths cut through the meadow.  There is also light and dark and a sense of destination, such as the close planting of trees in the photo below.

However, there were some things that for me didn’t quite work.  As I have already mentioned the topiary in the green theatre but also the canal at the front of the house. This seemed to be a new addition, well the bricks looked newish.  The canal runs from the house to the front of the property between square beds of Iris siberica each with an apple tree in it.  The reason this jarred for me is possibly the brightness of the brick, which will obviously mellow with time but more likely because the canal  doesn’t have straight edges as is the case with most canals, instead it wiggles.  For me the curved edges bore no relationship to any thing else in this area so I couldn’t understand the reasoning behind it.

Before I visited this garden I had read an article in Gardens Illustrated which listed Bryan’s Ground as one of Britain’s top 10 dreamy gardens.  I was sceptical as I know that it is rare for articles about gardens to be at all critical but this time their positive review was well justified.  However, I wouldn’t use the adjective dreamy, for me the garden is sensual, evocative, dramatic (in places), and somewhere I will be going back to again next year without fail.

‘Gardens as Art’ – My thoughts on the debate

Will I find a great garden through this door?

Another RHS show and the discussion of gardens as art rears its head again, particularly as RHS Hampton Court Flower Show is known for its conceptual gardens.  Now I have never been to this show partly because it is a challenge for me to get to but also because I feel a little weary of flower shows by this time.  However, whilst I may not have gone to the show I have seen plenty of photos of the gardens and also picked up on the discussions about ‘gardens as ar’t not least Victoria’s piece in the Independent.

This is a debate which seems to be struggling to be heard and to be taken forward and this has made me consider what my response is.  For me the first stage is to clarify what exactly is meant as ‘art’ in this context.  Art is defined in the Cambridge Dictionary as something that is created through painting, sculpture or drawing.  Oxford Dictionaries define art as  ‘the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power…’  Both definitions concentrate on the traditional forms of art – painting, sculpture and drawing but the Oxford Dictionary definition is of more use to us in this debate.  For me there are levels of art.  I go to an art class and produce pictures but there is such a vast chasm between my meagre offerings and say the work of Picasso that to me lumping them together as art is ridiculous.  There are paintings and then there are paintings; yes they are all art but to me there is a higher level of Art with  a capital A.  This is Art which causes an emotional response or challenges me intellecutally – my daubings certainly do not do this but Mark Rothko’s Seagram Murals challenged me and then caused a strong emotional response as did the Burne-Jones’ stained glass windows in Birmingham Cathedral.  Chinua Achebe’s book Things Fall Apart had a profound impact on me causing me to rethink my heritage and how I felt about being a European.  For me these responses are caused by Art. I don’t get this sort of response from something like the awful pebble pictures beloved of Ikea customers but this is also seen by some as art.

One of the things that the advocates of the debate rail against is that people do not critcise gardens preferring to use safe descriptive terms such as ‘lovely’ or ‘nice”.  They feel that this is  because we are frightened to upset the garden creator by criticising it.  I don’t think this is the case.  I suspect that if you took those people who described gardens as lovely or beautiful and put them in an art gallery they would use the same terminology. The average man in the street doesn’t have the vocabulary to express their reactions to art sufficiently; it is left to those who have spent time studying their subject maybe whilst at University.  Whilst you can study garden design this is more from the practical doing it point of view with a view to being a garden designer than a garden critic. So it is hardly surprising that there is little criticism of gardens; we just don’t have the terminology or experience.

The other hurdle that this debate has is the use of the word ‘garden’.  To me and I am sure many others this word conjures up an image of your average surburban garden not something worthy of being considered to be art.  So how is this debate to be  taken seriously by people in the art world.  The debate needs a better strapline.

Having got that out of the way I then found myself wondering whether many gardens have come about through the creators desire to create a piece of art – I suspect there are few.  Leaving your run of the mill suburban garden aside, it seems to me that the majority of gardens are created progressively and develop and the creators taste change and knowledge is expanded.  Some of the criticism of gardens is that they have become a refuge for plants that the gardener has collected on their travels and corralled together in their garden.  However, for someone like me the only way to learn about plants and how they grow is to buy one and plant it in the garden.  Over time I decide that I don’t like that sort of plant or I appreciate a particular quality of another plant. I see how it works with other plants and my knowledge expands.  With this knowledge maybe one day I will create a garden that will cause an emotional response but I need to learn how to use  my materials first just as the great artists learnt how to paint first.  No novice picks up a pen and paper and creates a masterpiece.

There are many gardens that are designed as a whole often at the behest of people far wealthy then I and designed by designers with a wealth of experience but even though these gardens are designed it does not mean they are Art.  They are designed to fulfill their owner’s needs and I  often feel that gardens designed for anyone other than the designer themself lack sole.  Many of the great works of art were not produced at the behest of a patron they have come about because their creator wanted to express an emotion, an idea, an ideology or to challenge.  Often the great works of art were reviled when they were first created, criticised in every way but then as humans the majority of us  like the safety of what we know.  Those of us who are happy to say what we think and to hell with it are in the minority, for me there is far too much of what I call the Emperors New Clothes syndrome.  By this I mean someone who is considered knowledgeable says something is great and everyone follows on like sheep agreeing with them.

I think the body of fantastic gardens needs to grow considerably before people start to see gardens as art.  I have visited a number of gardens now and to date, whilst there have been gardens that I liked or enjoyed, and many that I disliked, no garden has ever had the impact on me that Kadinsky’s landscape at the Ashmoleum did.  When that happens I will finally believe that gardens can be art.