- Christopher Lloyd in Christopher Lloyd's Gardening Year
Showing posts with label Christopher Lloyd. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christopher Lloyd. Show all posts
09 October 2014
October
"Very much a favorite month, this. Even writing a capital O at the start of its name is a pleasure. Of course, the weather can be foul; when can't it? But October does give us spells of the most delectable weather, too, and the golden warmth of its light invests everything with its glow. Nights have a nip in them but by day the air is soft again and we just need to relax in appreciation."
07 September 2012
Great Barn Restoration at Great Dixter
As any garden designer knows, the composition of a garden is more than just plants. There are other elements to consider: water, the form of the land, climate, paving, and buildings. In the not-too-distant past gardens were designed around structures from which the garden could be viewed and appreciated, the buildings and the gardens integrated into a unified whole. Without one, the other would be incomplete. Great Dixter is that kind of garden with that kind of house but it's the Great Barn that was in the spotlight last weekend.
The Great Barn, with medieval timbers and triple-cowled 19th century oast house, is a massive hulk of a structure brooding over several parts of the garden. It gives the Barn Garden its name and when viewed from down in the Sunk Garden, the enormous undulating sea of roof tiles is almost imposing yet you never feel engulfed by it.
The white cowls of the Oast House pivot with the wind and are a reminder of this garden's past as a working farm. The medieval farmer who sheltered his beasts in the barn over winter and the 19th and 20th century hop workers processing the season's harvest probably wouldn't recognize the garden today, but they would know that structure without a shadow of a doubt.
It's fortunate for us and for the history of the area that these buildings were preserved when the Lloyd family bought the tired estate in 1909. Edwin Lutyens designed the gardens around them - the barn, cattle troughs, hovels, bothies, cart sheds, even a pig pen, were all woven into the fabric of the garden and are integral notes in the composition. Perhaps even more fortunate was the desire by the current Trust to restore these wonderful edifices to their former glory instead of following the trend of commercial conversion to tea rooms and gift shops.
Don't get me wrong, I've been to plenty of gardens with fancy stable blocks converted to tea rooms and gift shops and, for the most part, all have been well done and they work for those gardens but covering the interior of Dixter's wonderful old barn with sheet rock and plunking in a lino service counter burdened with cakes and packaged sandwiches just isn't Dixter. Christopher Lloyd was adamant that the place not be mothballed and sealed in aspic when he died, nor that it become too commercialized or institutionalized. Head gardener and Trust CEO Fergus Garrett is determined that Christo's wishes be honored and the character of Great Dixter be respected in every aspect of managing the gardens, right down to the care of these magnificent old buildings. The world needs more like Fergus, I say.
Fergus called the restoration of the barn "the icing on the cake" of a multi-million pound restoration scheme focused on the buildings that has been ongoing since Christo's death in 2006, including the acquisition of Dixter Farm down the track, which was restored and made into an education center and student accommodations. Now there's a worthy conversion for you. With a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund and donations from friends and private contributors, the barn project began in late 2011. I was fortunate enough to be there to see it before work began, then to visit as it was ongoing, and finally to see the fabulous new restoration opened to the public.
One of the things I love about Dixter is their stewardship of the land. With an eye to the future oak from the Dixter woods was harvested years ago, milled, and set out to season so it could be used in the restoration. Some was used in the house to replace rotting 15th century timbers, and as much as possible was used in the barn. The coppice woods are still managed and the poles, peasticks, twigs, etc. are all still used in the gardens. Students this year even learned how to split sweet chestnut and make ladders and hurdles, all with hand tools. In keeping with this form of management that honors the ancient traditions, an area of the barn was set up to demonstrate these hand-crafts and the products made there are put to work in the garden or made available in the shop. All using locally sourced materials, all made by traditional hand-craft, right there under the beams of the medieval barn. How cool is that!?
But enough talk, there are lots of pictures to see. If you're in East Sussex this autumn, a stop at Dixter is a must. The house and garden - and now great barn - are open until 28 October and believe me when I tell you there will still be plenty to see in the garden.
The garden at Great Dixter is open Tuesday - Sunday and Bank Holiday Mondays from 11-5 and the house is open from 2-5 until 28 October and will re-open 1st April. See their website for admission cost and special events and study days throughout the year.
Links to videos of the project can be found here and here. Watch them. But be warned, you just might fall in love with the place.
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| The Great Barn, Great Dixter |
The white cowls of the Oast House pivot with the wind and are a reminder of this garden's past as a working farm. The medieval farmer who sheltered his beasts in the barn over winter and the 19th and 20th century hop workers processing the season's harvest probably wouldn't recognize the garden today, but they would know that structure without a shadow of a doubt.
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| South face of the Oast House |
Don't get me wrong, I've been to plenty of gardens with fancy stable blocks converted to tea rooms and gift shops and, for the most part, all have been well done and they work for those gardens but covering the interior of Dixter's wonderful old barn with sheet rock and plunking in a lino service counter burdened with cakes and packaged sandwiches just isn't Dixter. Christopher Lloyd was adamant that the place not be mothballed and sealed in aspic when he died, nor that it become too commercialized or institutionalized. Head gardener and Trust CEO Fergus Garrett is determined that Christo's wishes be honored and the character of Great Dixter be respected in every aspect of managing the gardens, right down to the care of these magnificent old buildings. The world needs more like Fergus, I say.
Fergus called the restoration of the barn "the icing on the cake" of a multi-million pound restoration scheme focused on the buildings that has been ongoing since Christo's death in 2006, including the acquisition of Dixter Farm down the track, which was restored and made into an education center and student accommodations. Now there's a worthy conversion for you. With a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund and donations from friends and private contributors, the barn project began in late 2011. I was fortunate enough to be there to see it before work began, then to visit as it was ongoing, and finally to see the fabulous new restoration opened to the public.
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| Opening of the Great Barn 3 Sept 2012 |
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| The Great Barn and Oast House in Spring 2011 before restoration began |
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| Spring 2011 |
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| Sept. 2012 |
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| Brimstone would have been kept in the curved niches to feed the fire (middle door) under the drying floor |
 The restored hop press. Dried hops were pressed into bags hanging from below.   Hop workers wrote the start date of hops harvest on the joists, which have been preserved.  |
| Fergus addresses the crowd on opening day 3 Sept 2012 |
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| Exterior of the barn and oast before restoration, Spring 2011 |
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| November 2011 |
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| September 2012, seen from the Solar Garden |
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| The garden side of the barn offers shelter for visitors and a mess room for the gardeners. Fergus shares a moment with Rachael and James, the first two Christopher Lloyd Scholars (notice they're all wearing primary colors. I love that!) |
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| Testimonies to enduring craftsmanship and sensitive stewardship: early morning light touches the 15th century Great Hall, 19th century oast and medieval great barn with a pale setting moon (top right) smiling down. Try imagining the garden without them. 4 Sept. 2012 |
Links to videos of the project can be found here and here. Watch them. But be warned, you just might fall in love with the place.
07 April 2011
You Have to Start Somewhere
So much has happened since we arrived at Great Dixter it's difficult to pick just one, or even two, subjects to elaborate on because, really, if I were to dive in and pull one out and tell you all about it we'd be here for days! Days, I tell you!
Like the day we accompanied our new friend James, the first Christopher Lloyd Scholar here at Dixter, to the RHS Garden Wisley and how enchanted we all were with the Alpine House. Or the day we visited Beth Chatto's garden and met Beth (how can a woman so small have so much energy?) who gave us all a hug! And speaking of energy, I could go on at great length about working with the likes of Fergus Garrett, who leaves the Energizer Bunny absolutely knackered and begging for a breather. Then there was the day we went to Sissinghurst Garden just at closing and were permitted to wander the garden at will until it was too dark to see anything. How about a magical morning walk in the woods with Dan Hinkley to view the wild daffodil in its native habitat? And I can't forget the perfect sunny Sunday that James, Emma, and I explored the public footpaths from Dixter to Bodiam Castle and enjoyed a cream tea with one of the retired volunteers there who was full of fantastic stories and wonderful information of the area.
And it's only been a month! Where shall I possibly begin?
As Fergus says, you have to start somewhere so I'll start at the beginning:
The estate of Dixter appears in the books as far back as the 1200's. That's the 13th century, or almost 800 years ago. However you look at it, Dixter's been here for a reeeeeally long time! It was owned by a succession of noble gentlemen who, in one way or another, had garnered favor with the Monarchy and accumulated varieties of titles, lands, wealth, and sons-in-law. They had interesting names but the one we're most interested in is Lloyd, which enters the record book in 1910 when the estate was purchased as a new family home for Nathaniel and Daisy Lloyd and their growing brood. By this time the original 15th century timber framed hall house - built sometime around 1450 - and the surrounding farmland had been neglected and on the market for over ten years.
The Lloyd's hired the well-know architect Edwin Lutyens to restore and enlarge the dwelling, which he did by incorporating another hall - this one much newer and somewhat humbler than the Great Hall, dating to about 1500 - the timbers of which were numbered, disassembled, transported, and reassembled at Dixter with a modern kitchen and bedroom wing joining the two timbered structures. Modern amenities such as central heat, electricity, and indoor plumbing were added as well, enabling the earth closets in use at the time to be replaced with water closets*.
Lutyens also laid out the framework of the gardens with decided input from Mr. Lloyd and it was his wife Daisy who became the first real gardener at Dixter. Of their six children only the youngest, Christopher (1921-2006) showed an inclination to gardening and it was he who made the garden famous by experimenting with plants and plant combinations then writing about them and the garden in his inimitable style. He was simultaneously a maverick and a trendsetter in the gardening world (putting pink and yellow together just wasn't done, darling!).
Dixter, under the green fingers of Daisy and Christo was really a garden ahead of its time: Daisy planted the first wildflower meadows at Dixter, which Christo expanded. Now, wildlife studies have found that the plant and insect species formerly so common in the UK have diminished in alarming degrees because of the reduction of natural meadowland. Christo's head gardener Fergus is continuing to expand the meadows at Dixter which has encouraged an increase in population of both moths and butterflies as well as the rare native meadow orchid, happily colonizing in Dixter's long grass.
Dixter has always made use of its own compost, taking the cuttings, clippings, and debris from garden and kitchen, heaping it all into massive piles and waiting patiently for nature to do its thing until the compost is ready to use in the garden. Large iron tubs in the nursery collect rain water and an underground tank collects well water run down from the high meadow, fed by gravity, for use in watering nursery plants and the plethora of pot displays in the garden.
Plants in the garden are buttressed by poles, canes, and pea sticks that come from the Dixter coppice woods or the garden itself. Everything is used that possibly can be, little is wasted, and everything that can be reused, is. This all began 100 years ago, before such a thing as conservation was hip and before the word 'sustainability' began buzzing around like a vibrating mobile phone. Not bad for a garden that is still run the 'old way', is it?
As with any family that owns a large estate there was some drama involved in procuring Dixter after Christopher's death but it has been secured and is now run by the Great Dixter Charitable Trust while the garden is managed by Fergus Garrett and his team of amazing gardeners in the way Christo gardened. It is still seen very much as a garden going forward, not sealed in aspic to preserve it forever unchanged, and the recurring theme regarding new plants and combinations is "let's see what happens".
It's a hugely dynamic garden, celebrating just over 100 years of cultivation. It's a pretty amazing place to be and in the months to come I'll try to steal a few moments between adventures to regale you with tales and information. For now, have a look at some pretty pictures or Google 'earth closet' and see if I'm not telling you the truth!
*Earth closets were invented in the 1860's by a Mr. Moule and basically constituted a commode with a pail full of earth under it. This was a major boon to housekeeping and if you believe the memoirs of certain house maids, carrying a bucket of soiled earth down to fertilize** the garden was infinitely preferable to emptying chamber pots. This invention is being renewed in light of the new "green movement" as self-composting toilets.
**Lest you utter a moue of distaste at the thought of human waste being used as fertilizer, allow me to direct you to the ingredient list of some bagged compost products. Some of them contain "bio solids", more commonly known as sewage sludge. Makes you think about what you're putting in your garden, doesn't it?
Like the day we accompanied our new friend James, the first Christopher Lloyd Scholar here at Dixter, to the RHS Garden Wisley and how enchanted we all were with the Alpine House. Or the day we visited Beth Chatto's garden and met Beth (how can a woman so small have so much energy?) who gave us all a hug! And speaking of energy, I could go on at great length about working with the likes of Fergus Garrett, who leaves the Energizer Bunny absolutely knackered and begging for a breather. Then there was the day we went to Sissinghurst Garden just at closing and were permitted to wander the garden at will until it was too dark to see anything. How about a magical morning walk in the woods with Dan Hinkley to view the wild daffodil in its native habitat? And I can't forget the perfect sunny Sunday that James, Emma, and I explored the public footpaths from Dixter to Bodiam Castle and enjoyed a cream tea with one of the retired volunteers there who was full of fantastic stories and wonderful information of the area.
And it's only been a month! Where shall I possibly begin?
As Fergus says, you have to start somewhere so I'll start at the beginning:
The estate of Dixter appears in the books as far back as the 1200's. That's the 13th century, or almost 800 years ago. However you look at it, Dixter's been here for a reeeeeally long time! It was owned by a succession of noble gentlemen who, in one way or another, had garnered favor with the Monarchy and accumulated varieties of titles, lands, wealth, and sons-in-law. They had interesting names but the one we're most interested in is Lloyd, which enters the record book in 1910 when the estate was purchased as a new family home for Nathaniel and Daisy Lloyd and their growing brood. By this time the original 15th century timber framed hall house - built sometime around 1450 - and the surrounding farmland had been neglected and on the market for over ten years.
The Lloyd's hired the well-know architect Edwin Lutyens to restore and enlarge the dwelling, which he did by incorporating another hall - this one much newer and somewhat humbler than the Great Hall, dating to about 1500 - the timbers of which were numbered, disassembled, transported, and reassembled at Dixter with a modern kitchen and bedroom wing joining the two timbered structures. Modern amenities such as central heat, electricity, and indoor plumbing were added as well, enabling the earth closets in use at the time to be replaced with water closets*.
Lutyens also laid out the framework of the gardens with decided input from Mr. Lloyd and it was his wife Daisy who became the first real gardener at Dixter. Of their six children only the youngest, Christopher (1921-2006) showed an inclination to gardening and it was he who made the garden famous by experimenting with plants and plant combinations then writing about them and the garden in his inimitable style. He was simultaneously a maverick and a trendsetter in the gardening world (putting pink and yellow together just wasn't done, darling!).
Dixter, under the green fingers of Daisy and Christo was really a garden ahead of its time: Daisy planted the first wildflower meadows at Dixter, which Christo expanded. Now, wildlife studies have found that the plant and insect species formerly so common in the UK have diminished in alarming degrees because of the reduction of natural meadowland. Christo's head gardener Fergus is continuing to expand the meadows at Dixter which has encouraged an increase in population of both moths and butterflies as well as the rare native meadow orchid, happily colonizing in Dixter's long grass.
Dixter has always made use of its own compost, taking the cuttings, clippings, and debris from garden and kitchen, heaping it all into massive piles and waiting patiently for nature to do its thing until the compost is ready to use in the garden. Large iron tubs in the nursery collect rain water and an underground tank collects well water run down from the high meadow, fed by gravity, for use in watering nursery plants and the plethora of pot displays in the garden.
Plants in the garden are buttressed by poles, canes, and pea sticks that come from the Dixter coppice woods or the garden itself. Everything is used that possibly can be, little is wasted, and everything that can be reused, is. This all began 100 years ago, before such a thing as conservation was hip and before the word 'sustainability' began buzzing around like a vibrating mobile phone. Not bad for a garden that is still run the 'old way', is it?
As with any family that owns a large estate there was some drama involved in procuring Dixter after Christopher's death but it has been secured and is now run by the Great Dixter Charitable Trust while the garden is managed by Fergus Garrett and his team of amazing gardeners in the way Christo gardened. It is still seen very much as a garden going forward, not sealed in aspic to preserve it forever unchanged, and the recurring theme regarding new plants and combinations is "let's see what happens".
It's a hugely dynamic garden, celebrating just over 100 years of cultivation. It's a pretty amazing place to be and in the months to come I'll try to steal a few moments between adventures to regale you with tales and information. For now, have a look at some pretty pictures or Google 'earth closet' and see if I'm not telling you the truth!
 |
| Entrance to Great Dixter - this is part of the original 1450 manor house restored by Lutyens |
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| Horticulture students at Dixter for a volunteer weekend are seated on the wall of the Terrace with the imported Benenden Hall looming in the background |
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| Anemone blooming in a pot display on the porch |
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| Dixter's sheep (part of the meadow management crew) |
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| The famous Long Border in early spring |
*Earth closets were invented in the 1860's by a Mr. Moule and basically constituted a commode with a pail full of earth under it. This was a major boon to housekeeping and if you believe the memoirs of certain house maids, carrying a bucket of soiled earth down to fertilize** the garden was infinitely preferable to emptying chamber pots. This invention is being renewed in light of the new "green movement" as self-composting toilets.
**Lest you utter a moue of distaste at the thought of human waste being used as fertilizer, allow me to direct you to the ingredient list of some bagged compost products. Some of them contain "bio solids", more commonly known as sewage sludge. Makes you think about what you're putting in your garden, doesn't it?
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