To answer your questions... Benedetta Origo, La Foce, Chianciano Terme, Italy.

I visited the garden of La Foce in a sunny day of September. The creation of Iris and Antonio Origo, supported by Cecil Ross Pinsent, English architect and friend, it is today a superb and mature garden. Walking along the paths and up and down the stairs, I discovered its formal terraces and wilder areas, green rooms and coloured flowers, old cypresses and fruit trees. From the long wisteria pergola that stretches from the villa and disappears along the hillside, I enjoyed perfect views on the surrounding countryside, the harsh Val d'Orcia, around 65 km south of Siena. Today, Benedetta Origo, one of the two daughters of Iris and Antonio Origo, takes care of the garden with passion and curiosity. She accompanied our group of the Italian Branch of the Mediterranean Garden Society during the visit, recalling the life at La Foce with Ethne Clarke, author and busy editor-in-chief of Organic Gardening.

I contacted Benedetta a few days ago with some questions about the garden, and she kindly answered me.

TravelinaGarden: We entered the garden from the main courtyard in front of the villa walking up a few steps and passing under an arch in a clipped hedge. The simple passage could easily go unnoticed, but, beyond it, the garden was even more surprising and inviting. Was this the original entrance?

Benedetta Origo: I'm not quite sure what you mean by the original entrance - to the garden? But the was no 'original' garden. It was completely created by Pinsent and my parents, from 1925 to 1939. The narrowness of the passage is necessary because of the road passing just there.

TravelinaGarden: Cecil Pinsent designed the structure and the decorative elements of the garden, while your mother filled it with flowers. He interpreted the Renaissance style flourished in Florence in the 15th century, shaping the garden on the steep hillside, linking it to the house and to the landscape with axes and vistas, using symmetry and geometry for a place that was part of the everyday life of the family. Which were the sources of inspiration for your mother? 

Benedetta Origo: My mother had grown up in a beautiful Renaissance garden herself, the Villa Medici in Fiesole. She had also been to La Pietra, I Tatti, etc etc. and her mother had been very knowledgeable about flowers.

TravelinaGarden: The original scheme included a massive use of bedding plants and bulbs for the flowerbeds, besides roses, lavender and other flowers. Annuals were grown from seed in the garden, and I read that your mother received several bushes of rose as a gift. Where did she find seeds, bulbs and flowers? Did she rely on exchanges with the local community and foreign friends or she purchased them?

Benedetta Origo: She ordered her plants and bulbs mostly from England, but also from catalogues, Italian or others, and would visit nurseries like Sgaravatti or Barni. She also worked with Mary Senni (an American married to an Italian and living near Arezzo and Grottaferrata) who cultivated and crossed irises, and with who, she published the magazine 'Il giardino fiorito'.

TravelinaGarden: We saw the Rose Garden in a beautiful day of autumn, with the geometric beds so overflowing with anemones and other late flowering plants that it did not seem to be room for other plants. Is the flowering season of this part of the garden concentrated in autumn or it stretches along the year? If so, which flowers feature winter and in spring in the Rose Garden?

 

Benedetta Origo: They are all perennials, with alliums and other mediterranean essences which create diversity.

 TravelinaGarden: You introduced perennials instead of annuals that required a lot of maintenance and expenses. Are there other difficult aspects in the conservation and maintenance of the garden? 

Benedetta Origo: There are more blights, especially of trees, than in my mother's times - cypress of course, but also of alloro, box ... and of course the roses had to be replaced as they died or stopped producing well, because you cannot replant roses in the same spot ('rose replant disorder'). There is a lot more lavender, and rosemary, and thyme. I have had to replace some wisteria, which has a wonderful spring flowering. I have also planted many bulbs on the terraces. I also introduced more fruit trees on the terraces (there were only cherry trees), which seem to be doing well, especially trees from the 'Archeologia arborea' nursery (apples, quinces, pears, plums).

TravelinaGarden: What are your plans for the garden in the near future?

Benedetta Origo: I have ordered more bulbs and will sow wild flower seeds, which enliven the colours of the green grasses of the terraces under the flowering fruit trees. There will be paths mown in the high grass in spring, but the rest will stay uncut until well into June. We now have a lot more water for irrigation of the garden, as I have recently added 5 cisterne to collect the extra water from a spring (which otherwise got lost).

Photos:
TravelinaGarden, La Foce, September 2013.

Links:

Links:
La Foce, Strada della Vittoria, Chianciano Terme Siena Italy
http://www.lafoce.com/

Mediterranean Garden Society - Italy
http://www.mediterraneangardensociety.org/branches-it.html