I walked along the flower beds of the Great Garden at Cliveden, in Buckinghamshire, reading 'Spring and Winter Flower Garden'.
'Why then should we not in this matter take a lesson from nature? and if flowers at that season bloom in the fields and woods, they can also be made to bloom in the garden. The most beautiful of these wild flowers are gone before we can venture to turn out the summer plants.'
In the following chapters, he sums up his experience providing combinations of flowers and shrubs. Flowers with 'good habits and plenty of bloom', 'sufficiently hardy to keep the beds green in the dead part of the winter months, and come out in spring with that display necessary to make the garden attractive'; flowers 'well adapted for the season in which they are required' so that 'they are got without the expense of houses or fuel and ...without glass'. He focuses on colours for the spring display, while berries and variegated leaves are considered for the winter months. For spring, he suggests: Anemone 'if a good bed of scarlet is wanted', Alyssum saxatile 'a fine yellow', while 'for blue we have the beautiful Myosotis arvensis', and Pansies and Primroses are available in 'an extensive variety of colours.' Annuals are preferred and the use of bulbs is encouraged to arrange rows, chains and ribbons and create sophisticated designs.
He offers some practical examples choosing
among the flower beds created at Cliveden in 1862 and 1863. In 1863, for
example, the Great Garden, the impressive formal parterre to the south
of the house, was arranged with:
n.1 bed blue Myosotis and La Candeur Tulip.
2 Anemone and yellow Jonquil.
3 Limnanthes Douglassii and Tournesol Tulip.
4 Silene pendula, pink, and Rex Rubrorum Tulip.
5 Silene pendula, white.
6 blue Myosotis, Queen Victoria Tulip.
7 mixed Anemone and Narcissus poeticus.
8 yellow Alyssum saxatile and yellow Rose Tulip.
The beds 'have edging of Evergreen Privet ... 8 inches high and 9 broad', 'next to this .. is the same with grass' and 'the centre of each bed being planted with either Rhododendrons or Azaleas'. Spring flowerings matched those of the surrounding Thorns and Lilacs, while Gladioli and Hollyhocks followed in summer.
Nothing is neglected: 'each round circle is planted with a good row of Crocus, then Cerastium tomentosum; behind this a belt of blue Myosotis and Wallflowers, with a centre of Honesty.' Mr. Fleming explains that he gets a best effect with a limited variety of plants, which is also more convenient for cost savings and labour. 'To fill the beds moderately it requires two thousand plants, and from six to eight hundred Tulips when well filled'. A triumph.
There is much more to read in the book and to see in the garden, a living page of garden history. But, looking at the parterre that, from 2010, is planted again according to Mr. Fleming's designs, I thought about the observation of wild nature and its consequences, about the bedding system of Mr. John Fleming, and, few years later, the natural garden of Mr. William Robinson.
Written in 1864 by John Fleming, Head Gardener to the Duchess of Sutherland at Cliveden, the book explains his 'system of Spring Flower Gardening': a successful succession of bloomings that allowed him to have appealing flower beds before and after the explosion of summer flowers.
Common practices to overcome this problem included the creation of 'separate gardens, covering their surface with different coloured materials; ... filling a portion with evergreens in pots, ...[using] ivy'. These solutions, however, proved not entirely satisfactory to Mr. Fleming, who, especially near the house, felt the need for something more thrilling. Inspiration came from nature, from the wild flowers that he saw blooming after winter. In the book, he muses:
Common practices to overcome this problem included the creation of 'separate gardens, covering their surface with different coloured materials; ... filling a portion with evergreens in pots, ...[using] ivy'. These solutions, however, proved not entirely satisfactory to Mr. Fleming, who, especially near the house, felt the need for something more thrilling. Inspiration came from nature, from the wild flowers that he saw blooming after winter. In the book, he muses:
'Why then should we not in this matter take a lesson from nature? and if flowers at that season bloom in the fields and woods, they can also be made to bloom in the garden. The most beautiful of these wild flowers are gone before we can venture to turn out the summer plants.'
In the following chapters, he sums up his experience providing combinations of flowers and shrubs. Flowers with 'good habits and plenty of bloom', 'sufficiently hardy to keep the beds green in the dead part of the winter months, and come out in spring with that display necessary to make the garden attractive'; flowers 'well adapted for the season in which they are required' so that 'they are got without the expense of houses or fuel and ...without glass'. He focuses on colours for the spring display, while berries and variegated leaves are considered for the winter months. For spring, he suggests: Anemone 'if a good bed of scarlet is wanted', Alyssum saxatile 'a fine yellow', while 'for blue we have the beautiful Myosotis arvensis', and Pansies and Primroses are available in 'an extensive variety of colours.' Annuals are preferred and the use of bulbs is encouraged to arrange rows, chains and ribbons and create sophisticated designs.
He offers some practical examples choosing
among the flower beds created at Cliveden in 1862 and 1863. In 1863, for
example, the Great Garden, the impressive formal parterre to the south
of the house, was arranged with:n.1 bed blue Myosotis and La Candeur Tulip.
2 Anemone and yellow Jonquil.
3 Limnanthes Douglassii and Tournesol Tulip.
4 Silene pendula, pink, and Rex Rubrorum Tulip.
5 Silene pendula, white.
6 blue Myosotis, Queen Victoria Tulip.
7 mixed Anemone and Narcissus poeticus.
8 yellow Alyssum saxatile and yellow Rose Tulip.
The beds 'have edging of Evergreen Privet ... 8 inches high and 9 broad', 'next to this .. is the same with grass' and 'the centre of each bed being planted with either Rhododendrons or Azaleas'. Spring flowerings matched those of the surrounding Thorns and Lilacs, while Gladioli and Hollyhocks followed in summer.
Nothing is neglected: 'each round circle is planted with a good row of Crocus, then Cerastium tomentosum; behind this a belt of blue Myosotis and Wallflowers, with a centre of Honesty.' Mr. Fleming explains that he gets a best effect with a limited variety of plants, which is also more convenient for cost savings and labour. 'To fill the beds moderately it requires two thousand plants, and from six to eight hundred Tulips when well filled'. A triumph.
There is much more to read in the book and to see in the garden, a living page of garden history. But, looking at the parterre that, from 2010, is planted again according to Mr. Fleming's designs, I thought about the observation of wild nature and its consequences, about the bedding system of Mr. John Fleming, and, few years later, the natural garden of Mr. William Robinson.
Photos:
TravelinaGarden, Cliveden, UK, May 2015.
Drawings from 'Spring and Winter Flower Garden'.
Further reading:
John Fleming, Spring and Winter Flower Garden, Journal of Horticulture and Cottage Garden Office, London, 1864.
https://archive.org/
Links:
Cliveden, Taplow, Maidenhead, Buckinghamshire
http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/cliveden/
Very good blog and very informative.
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