Weeding the Web

Quintessential Englishness: Capability Brown meets Shakespeare at Compton Verney

"It must have felt a bit bleak when it was finished," I remarked, staring out of the window at the enormous Cedars of Lebanon. 

"Hmm," agreed a fellow visitor, "they wouldn't have been able to transplant big trees like nowadays."

View from the first floor towards the bridge at Compton Verney

Were we right? We'll see...

This year is, of course, the 300th anniversary of Lancelot 'Capability' Brown's birth and we were admiring the grounds of Compton Verney, Warwickshire, where, as part of the celebrations around the country, they are restoring features that existed in Brown's original design.

Already, sinuous paths have been reinstated...

Not a great picture, but you can see the new, sinuous path that's been put in the western lawn since last year.

...the Ice House has been restored... 

The restored ice house at Compton Verney. Picture: Kate Evans, Compton Verney

...and later in the year, Brown's Grade I-listed chapel (which replaced the medieval church he dismissed from the lakeside) will be re-opened after extensive restoration.

The chapel on the left is currently under scaffolding and will be revealed in all its glory in June. Picture: Compton Verney

They're taking the long view in more ways than one, as the avenue he carved out, connecting the rising land on the horizon to the front view of the house with its then newly opened-up courtyard and chapel, is already partially replanted, with negotiations under way with the farmer who uses an adjoining field to complete the lines of trees.  Dr Steven Parissien, Director, has described the Heritage Lottery Fund-supported Park Restoration Project as "the most important capital programme taking place during the tricentennial year".

Not everything will be as Brown envisaged. Tall Wellingtonias, planted later, pierce the skyline and break the vista from the house but are here to stay.

The Wellingtonia Avenue at Compton Verney. "A chap must have been travelling round, putting them in," said Gary Webb. "There are quite a few Wellingtonia Avenues in this area."

"They don't harm the view," said Gary Webb, Head of Landscape and Gardens, "unless you put on your Capability Brown hat."

And Brown's landscapes weren't exactly wildlife-friendly. In the pursuit of perfection, dead trees and branches would have been removed and it's unlikely that the bullrushes now decorating the lake's edge would have been tolerated. Today, the Wilderness area includes a dipping platform and bird hide.

The bit you won't be interested in*

Following in the steps of William Kent, who had returned to England decades before with his head stuffed full of the Renaissance landscapes he'd seen in galleries and the desire to reproduce them on the land, Brown went a step further - to create landscapes that were markedly English.  At at time when a distinct English character was being created in other areas of the arts too (theatre, for example) at over 200 estates he virtually obliterated the past, sweeping away formal flowerbeds, avenues radiating from the house, parterres, small lakes and a causeway. (Am I the only one who wishes more of these earlier schemes remained?)

Instead, he presented his patron with an idealised version of the surrounding country, planting cedars, tulip trees and London planes nearer the house, blending them into what was already there, so it was difficult to see where the natural landscape began. He created views over hidden ha-has to distant shelter belts of trees. "It was a trick of Brown's," said Gary, "to put trees on the horizon."

He majored on native trees and created sweeping pastures in a landscape that, not only was ideal for hunting, shooting and carriage-driving, but gave the landowner farmland and lakes providing income and food.

No one can say he wasn't successful; think of an English landscape, I'd say, and think of Capability Brown.

Quintessential Englishness exhibited

In addition to the work on the grounds, Compton Verney has given over a room to looking at what Brown created and what he replaced. It includes some nifty acetate overlays to hold up in front of the windows for a better idea of "before" and "after" views, and this modern bronze portrait head: 

Current Exhibitions at Compton Verney

Who else is inextricably woven into the fabric of Englishness? Well, there's Shakespeare (celebrating a venerable 400th anniversary this year). As Capability Brown was creating the English landscape, Shakespeare had already played an important part in growing nationalism. Compton Verney's current headline exhibition, Shakespeare in Art - Tempest, Tyrants and Tragedy, looks at how art has responded to his plays since the 18th Century. 

Appropriately, it's been designed by Stephen Brimson Lewis, Director of Design for the Royal Shakespeare Company.  His theatrical touches give it real character. John Singer Sargent's Ellen Terry as Lady MacBeth is foot-lit and visitors walk a sloping floor (a stage or a ship's deck?) past images of The Tempest.

Ellen Terry as Lady MacBeth by John Singer Sargent. Copyright The Tate, London.

Amongst old favourites, such as Fuseli's Weird Sisters, there are some truly startling moments, such as the 3D installation, Ophelia's Ghost, from the award-winning studio of Kristin and Davy McGuire...

Ophelia's Ghost. Copyright Kristin and Davy MacGuire

...and the pared-down classicism of 1912 set designs by Ellen Terry's son, Edward Gordon Craig.

"You could reproduce his sets on stage now, and people would think they were modern," said Stephen Brimson Lewis.

The exhibits have been chosen particularly for their strong emotional response to Shakespearean scenes. However, would Shakespeare have quite the same impact today, if it weren't for the third subject in the limelight at Compton Verney?

Boydell's Vision - The Shakespeare Gallery in the 18th Century

Miranda, Prospero, Caliban and Ariel, a print from The Boydell Shakespeare Gallery, after Henry Fuseli. Copyright: York Museums Trust.

John Boydell, famous for his Gallery on Pall Mall, open 1789-1804, commissioned leading artists to paint gigantic scenes from Shakespeare's plays. Rosie Dias, curator of the Boydell's Vision, the pendant exhibition to Shakespeare in Art, said:

Boydell contributed to releasing Shakespeare into the public sphere and gave the public a sense of ownership that it hadn't had before.

He encouraged debate and criticism of the art, even having Miranda's face changed in one of the pictures because it was deemed too ugly by visitors; he forbade portraits of actual actors in the scenes, so moving the spotlight from the players to the characters and ensuring the pictures stepped away from theatrical representation to more literary and emotional responses. Voltaire had criticised Shakespeare for not adhering to the principles of classical drama; Boydell underlined his Englishness with attention to the plays' humour and sentimentality. We can safely say that it's no coincidence that the French Revolution was in full spate. Dias said of Boydell's Gallery:

It introduced a democratic conception of art, contrasting it with contemporary art theories regarding appreciation of fine arts as contingent upon class and education.

Surely this was the subtext: No need of a  Frenchie revolution here, thank you. We're far more advanced! 

Shakespeare and Capability Brown combined

Pleasingly Shakespeare and Compton Verney are entwined by more than their shared contributions to ideology. In 1968 that most Arcadian of plays, A Midsummer Night's Dream, was filmed in the most English landscape of Compton Verney.

Diana Rigg as Helena and Helen Mirren as Hermia in A Midsummer Night's Dream. Photo by David Farrell. Courtesy of the David Farrell Estate. Copyright DFP.

Photos from the shoot are part of the Shakespeare in Art exhibition.

After seeing the exhibition and walking the grounds, a more fitting setting is hard to imagine.

Upcoming Event

And those trees we mentioned at the beginning? Well, the agricultural revolution was well under way when Capability Brown created his landscapes, and new machinery meant that it was possible to transplant quite large mature trees. Later on our tour, Gary pointed out the likely height of a Brown-transplanted tree. It looked around 20 feet. 

Schedule your visit for Park Life!, the Georgian weekend on 25-26 June, and you'll see a reconstruction of the machinery used by Capability Brown to move his trees. The exhibitions run until 19th June.

*Ceryl Evans is director of Capability Brown Festival 2016. Interviewed for ProLandscaper this month, she said, "You've got a period of about 150 years in which Brown falls that no one really knows much about. So there's no point trying to talk about Capability Brown in terms of historical period; no one is interested in that." She's a social history curator and a mediaevalist, so  hardly anti-history, but personally I suspect that you, like me, find her comments unfathomable.

Past exhibitons at Compton Verney: 

• Dan Pearson's Arts and Crafts Meadow
• Creating an atmosphere with Sculpture: Kern Baby by Faye Claridge

Gardening in art: Abraham Cruzvillegas' Empty Lot at Tate Modern

The role of art in the garden is a recognised debate, but Tate Modern has turned this on its head by putting gardening into art. Abraham Cruzvillegas's Empty Lot, the latest installation in the Turbine Hall, creates a receding triangular vista of triangular raised beds.

Hyundai Commission 2015. Abraham Cruzvillegas: Empty Lot.
© Abraham Cruzvillegas. Photo credit: Andrew Dunkley © Tate 2015

The Tate's press release was not written by a gardener: "Flowers, mushrooms, and other greenery may grow depending on what seeds or bulbs have found their way into the soil."

The platforms hold a geometric grid of 240 wooden planters filled with compost and over 23 tonnes of soil collected from parks around London, including from Peckham, Haringey and Buckingham Palace; they'll be kept lit and watered during the six months of the installation, during which time visitors will get to see what grows.

Now, occasionally a piece of conceptual art raises me to enthusiasm. Olafur Eliasson's The Weather Project is a Turbine Hall installation that still resonates. He put a giant sun bathed in mist at the far end of the Turbine Hall to explore "ideas about experience, mediation and representation".  It also created a mysterious atmospheric beauty that made people linger to enjoy the peace.

But what has Empty Lot to offer? Perhaps gardeners are disadvantaged here. There's nothing that Cruzvillegas has done that doesn't happen every year in our own gardens in that weedy corner that we keep meaning to do something about. The only difference is that we'll get to see a lot of weedy corners corralled into the same space. There might be a moderate interest in comparing the seed content of Buckingham Palace with that of Peckham, but, assuming they didn't dig up a daffodil bed, I personally am not expecting an enormous difference*.

I'm not the only one:

Indoors, outdoors #emptylot by Abraham #cruzvillegas @autoconstruido @tate modern, and @CTCaravanserai last month pic.twitter.com/45rzfKrd1m

— JOHN JEFFERS (@ee92jlj) November 1, 2015

The Tate says:

The unpredictable nature of the work, which may grow and change from one week to the next, provokes questions about the city and nature, as well as wider ideas of chance, change, and hope.*

While conceptual art is often immense fun to visit, I generally have a problem with it.

First, you are left with the paucity of your own thoughts, which is why you should always visit any installation with at least one other person, who, with luck, will have different thoughts.

Secondly,  anyone can pretty much read anything into any object in any position.  So, basically, a conceptual artist can think up any installation and submit it, and it'll mean something to someone.

Empty Lot includes artistic references. The triangular shape points east-west (not sure what the relevance is of that. Obviously, we all know that raised beds are best ranged north-south to catch the passing sun) and, says the Tate, recalls the strong diagonals of Russian avant-garde artists such as El Lissitzky and the geodesic domes of visionary architect Buckminster Fuller. Lissitzky was part of the Soviet Constructivist movement, which believed that art should have a social and political impact, although he was most pioneering in typography and book design, rather than 3D objects.  Geodesic domes are often used to grow things in - so it's a nicely oblique reference.

But it's pretty bleak on its own account, at the moment. There's a certain satisfaction in the sharp lines taking you off into the depth of the hall, and later, when it's bushier and grassier the paths may disappear into a green-massed distance. But, just in case you're looking forward to wandering into it, here's what the press release says: 

Visitors will be able to explore underneath the platforms by wandering through the supporting scaffolding and view them from above on the Turbine Hall bridge.

So, we can see its bottom but can't walk through it. So much for comparing the plants. So much for getting a feel for difference and detail. I predict it's going to look pretty homogeneous, looked at from the bridge. And I really can't summon up the enthusiasm for scaffolding expressed on Philippa Ellis's Arts Aloud blog. Anyway, I seem to remember another installation that created a similar effect, though the details escape me.

Moving on to analogies, "in the middle of a busy commercial area of London, the ‘empty lot’ is a space where nothing is produced but where change might happen." I wonder if that's even the case in his native Mexico?  Here an empty lot disappears into a whirl of corporate construction as fast as you can say 'knife'.

Still, what questions about nature might it be asking about the city and nature? 

• How far does the rigid structure of a city puts limits on the life within it?
• How much does the artificial life of the city create unnatural reactions? (After all, they are trying to make things grow through winter.)

Or what about the "wider ideas of chance, change, and hope"?

• The struggle for self-expression is found in the most awkward and desolate places.
• Put care into what seems unpromising and the results will (might) surprise you.

Challenge me further and I might come up with a fully fledged platitude. Which is part of my problem with it: nothing I've suggested is very new. My lack of imagination, perhaps. One tweet describes it as "a sculpture made out of hope".  Well, I'm hoping that you might come up with other ideas of what Empty Lot might be saying.

One point which hasn't been mentioned in connection with Empty Lot is the teeming nature of the soil. Emphasis is concentrated on the emptiness. As one tweet asks: "From nothing, what may grow?" It would be wonderful to think that in this, the International Year of the Soil, at a time when world soils are maltreated and becoming dangerously impoverished, Cruzvillegas is actually trying to redefine the concept of soil itself, underlining its liveliness and how different treatment, environment and care decide whether it produces feast of famine. I don't get the impression, though, that his intention is anywhere near as enlightened.

Quite obviously a visit is in order, though I can't see much point in rushing there until most plants are well above the sides. There's plenty of time. The installation runs until 3rd April, 2016, and you can follow its progress at #emptylot. Requests for plant identification have already started, which is definitely something for gardeners to get their teeth into.

In the meantime, do comment below on what you think Cruzvillegas might teach us.

*According to Philippa Ellis, there are rumours that people are "seed-bombing" the beds. So, what emerges may not be so "accidental" as originally intended.

 

Prize draw: Digging Deep in the Garden by John Walker

Is gardening inherently eco-friendly? Could it do better?  These questions seldom make it into the limelight in garden writing. If you do see an article that asks them, though, there's a good chance it's been written by John Walker, three times winner of the Garden Media Guild's Environmental Award.

Now I'm offering you the chance to win a copy of John's Digging Deep in the Garden, a newly published collection of fourteen articles from "Digging Deep", the series that he originally wrote for Organic Gardening magazine.

In putting the book together, a paradox struck him:

Almost a decade since ‘Digging Deep’ took root, many of the issues I explored are still getting worse – think climate chaos, pesticide pollution, profligate energy use. And yet gritty garden writing exploring such topics is still almost non-existent; we plod on under the illusion – ably propped up by an out-of-touch media – that gardening and the wild, natural world are somehow opposites, rather than being intimately interwoven.

I was lucky enough to read John's articles first time round, when Organic Gardening magazine still existed and I too contributed (in a considerably less challenging manner) to its pages. John's article was always the first I turned to on opening the mag, to see what particular gauntlet was being thrown to the ground that month.

The wide range of issues covered are still very much with us and all together they pack quite a punch.  Climate change, compost, choice in garden centres, misleading magazine articles for novice gardeners, ethical supply, and the downgrading of organic gardening are merely a handful of the subjects looked at. He looks at current attitudes (still very much current), asks awkward questions, calls people to account.

It's all serious stuff, but mitigating this is the engaging writing style, wryly humorous in places, and the rallying cries to action. Yes, we can make a difference on an individual basis, and our choices do matter. It's heartening to find someone who thinks we have clout. And it's only by individuals changing their behaviour that general consensus is shifted to a new standing.

Compared with much of the output of the gardening press, Digging Deep shows what zest can be added to our gardening reading. When the garden industry campaigns to sell as much as possible to as many consumers as possible, it's arresting to question whether you, too, could manage to ditch the wheelie-bin (yes, the black one too), or whether you really need that heated propagator.

The arguments carry all the more weight because what shines from the book is that John, not only feels deeply about the matters discussed, but, as an long-time organic gardener, has the experience to speak authoritatively. 

Enter the Prize Draw

To celebrate the publication, there are two paperback copies up for grabs. To be in with a chance of winning Digging Deep in the Garden email [email protected] with "Prize Draw" in the subject line, by the end of Saturday 14th November.

The winner will be drawn at random from all the entries.

If you can't wait for the results of the draw, Digging Deep in the Garden is available in paperback at £4.99 and as an ebook at £1.99, via John's website, Earth-friendly Gardener, where you can also catch up with the latest reviews.

Terms and Conditions:

1. This giveaway is only available to people with a UK delivery address.

2. Entry closes at the end of Saturday 14th November.

3. The lucky winners will be notified by 18th November, via email. If John has not heard from him or her by midnight on 30th November, a new winner will be drawn.

4. There are two prizes of Digging Deep in the Garden, paperback version. No cash alternative.

 

 

 

 

 

Just how bad will 2015 winter be?

SHOCK WEATHER WARNING: Coldest winter for 50 YEARS set to bring MONTHS of heavy snow to UK

You can't have missed the news of doom last month. The Express's headline above pretty much sums it up.  And yesterday the Evening Standard reported that bookies have "slashed" odds on a White Christmas.

Snow inching its way off the garden table, winter 2013

Is a grim chill creeping into your heart? It sounds like a busy winter for a gardener: heaving pots indoors; swaddling prized plants in fleece; firing up the greenhouse heater; getting soaked as we frantically shake heavy snow from fastigiate firs that will never look the same again.

What is causing this shiver of anticipation? Several factors:

1. El Nino is set to be the strongest since 1950, when, according to a Telegraph report, snow lay on the highlands for over three months and fifteen inches fell on the Isle of Wight in three and a half hours.

2. A reduction in the speed and temperature of the Gulf Stream, said The Express, means that Britain has no protection from the Arctic cold, which means we could have a repeat of 1962-3 winter when the sea froze off Kent and temperatures were nearly -20C.

3. Bewick's Swans arrived at Welney Wetlands Centre, Norfolk, two weeks early, while a lone swan made it to Slimbridge, Gloucestershire, a whole twenty-five days ahead of last year (though, given that he's only a year old, I reckon his mates played a joke on him and lied about the date). Bewick's are said to "carry snow on their beaks" and arrive ahead of bad weather, so have possibly been driven here by colder-than-normal temperatures in Russia. Canada Geese have also arrived sooner than expected.

But...remove media hype and what are you left with? 

Handily, Accuweather have, uninvited, been posting to my inbox for a year now. They forecast that there might be powerful winds in December and cold air masses, but otherwise we're in for a tranquil time with near-normal temperatures. The worst storms will pass to our south, and below-normal temperatures will track down from the north only for brief periods, though if you're in Scotland or Ireland you'll have below-normal day temperatures for much of the time, with near-normal night temperatures. 

Goldfinch seeking seeds in the snow of 2012

Just not exciting enough for news. Compare Accuweather's prediction of five days of snow or ice in London (NB they forecast 15 last winter, which I'm pretty sure never materialised) with the Evening Standard's hysteria; this paltry number of days translates into "could cause travel chaos during festive period and grind the transport network to a halt".

(Pause to consider bizarre use of "grind".)

But perhaps Accuweather is being too cautious? Well,  UK Weather Forecast explains that El Nino's effects on UK weather are not well understood and weather has differed widely in past El Nino years. They currently favour a "winter of two halves", with usual autumn gales, heavy rain and snow at times, maybe turning colder after December. In beautifully measured tones, they declare: "It should be highlighted, though, that this coming winter does provide some mixed and contradicting signals in terms of possible weather and more time is required, in the coming month or so, to see how those signals develop before a more comprehensive prediction can be made."

Shifting to The Weather Outlook, we find that recent monthly temperatures can't be taken to indicate a really cold winter, although pressure patterns are pointing to a higher chance of colder weather than seemed likely a month ago. Overall, though?  "At this stage there isn't one overriding signal favouring either a colder or milder than average winter."

If it is cold and it rains, then there is a good chance of snow. The good old Met Office is quoted as saying: "“The probability that UK precipitation for October-November-December will fall into the driest of our five categories is 15 per cent and the probability that it will fall into the wettest of our five categories is 35 per cent.”

I make that more chance of being really wet than really dry, but actually 50/50 on its being somewhere in between.

So, I think we can all take a step back. It could be a good moment to order more fleece, bubble wrap and paraffin but, for most of us in the UK, it currently seems likely to be a pretty normal sort of winter.

UK Weather Forecast releases its last long-range forecast for winter at the end of next month - it's the one with the highest chance of accuracy - but given that weather forecasts aren't very accurate beyond a week ahead, I think they're more for entertainment than anything.

Oh, and for creating headlines.

 

Dan Pearson's Arts and Crafts Meadow at Compton Verney - last chance to see

Less than ten days remain to see an ephemeral work by Dan Pearson, who (and I know no one's forgotten) won this year's Best in Show at Chelsea Flower Show.

The Mown Parterre. Copyright Compton Verney Photograph by Stuart Thomas.

To accompany their exhibition, The Arts and Crafts House: Then and Now, Compton Verney, the Palladian house turned art gallery in Warwickshire, commissioned Pearson to design something for the West Lawn, where it could be seen by visitors through the windows of the galleries on the first floor and would lure them out into the wider landscape. After a summer's growth, it will look very different from the pictures below.

Dan was shown the exhibits to be included in the exhibition but given a totally free hand to design as he wished.

Having grown up in an Arts and Crafts house in Hampshire, where his mother decorated with William Morris wallpapers, he was fascinated to see the papers in the flesh. He immediately lighted on Trellis, with its balance of formality in the grid pattern and informality in the winding vines. 

Visual of the Compton Verney parterre at Compton Verney. Copyright Dan Pearson Studios

Not only does it encapsulate how the best-known proponents of Arts and Crafts garden design (Edward Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll) worked with the landscape (the formal framework provided by Lutyens' design, the informality by Jekyll's planting), but it's a rather nifty solution to what could have been an awkward juxtaposition of planting and classical facade.

"What's nice about the grid is that it takes reference from the formality of the house," said Pearson, "and then bleeds away into the trees." Thus it forms a solution to combining the formality of the Palladian villa design with an essentially informal parterre, which itself echoes more distant meadows in the landscape created by Capability Brown.

 

Pearson's design is a simplification of Trellis, with three large "pools" of wildflowers - Shirley poppies, corncockle, gypsophila, blue cornflowers and other colourful annuals - representing the roses in the Morris design, set in a meadow of perennials (these were not yet in bloom, thanks to the cold spring, when I visited in June). Fancifully, you can regard it as a living rendition, with the birds in the design represented by the living birds that inhabit the trees in the meadow.

"I thought I had to represent the design, rather than be slavish to it," said Pearson. "The grid works really well with the house and, without it, this would just be a meadow." 

After his Laurent Perrier Chatsworth garden at Chelsea this year, winning Best in Show, this continues to demonstrate Dan's interest in blurring the edges between gardening and nature, and - as he is at his home in Somerset - gardening and agriculture.

The Arts and Crafts movement encapsulated a connection between house and garden and, indoors, the exhibition gives ample space to photos of Folly Farm in Berks. When built, it was regarded by many as the best work to come from the collaboration of Lutyens and Jekyll and the photos compare the garden as originally planted by Jekyll with Dan Pearson's acclaimed restoration, which won Historic Garden Award from the Society of Garden Designers this year.  Pearson worked on it from 2009 to 2013, taking planting inspiration from Jekyll's palette, respecting the Edwardian roots, but adding more naturalism that blends the garden more into grounds and landscape.

Once you realise the affection and affinity that Pearson has for the work of Lutyens and Jekyll, it's easy to place him in the progression of garden history. "My work," he says, "is continuing in the the Arts and Crafts tradition."

The exhibition will be moving on to Newcastle but the meadow remains in a lasting legacy that Dan feels might create a versatile canvas in years to come. "Another artist can mow something else into it," he said, "It's a light-footed way to make something big and embracing."

The Arts and Crafts House: Then and Now, runs at Compton Verney until 13th September.  It traces the origins and appeal of the movement through work by those such as C R Ashbee, M H Baillie Scott and Ernest Gimson, among others, looking at silverware, textiles and utensils. 

Traditional tools accompanied by engravings by Stanley Anderson.

It examines iconic buildings such as Morris's The Red House and Sidney Barnsley's Beechanger, and features modern artwork and design that continue the Arts and Crafts tradition.

Porcelain vases by Andrew Wickes.

 

 

 

 

 

Dougal beats the Invisible Man for scarecrow stylishness

I was rather desolate this year to miss the Press open day at Mr Fothergill's, as my first foray into the nearer reaches of Cambridgeshire last year had been so enjoyable. (Never mind that I was on holiday - couldn't I have organised myself to do both?)

One part of the fun is  judging a staff competition. Last year, it was for the best unusual containers.This was my favourite:

 

Entry in Mr Fothergill's staff competition, 2014

 

Though this was the winner, and raised a smile too:

 

Winner of Mr Fothergill's staff competition, 2014

 This year, the staff were tempted into making scarecrows, which were set around the Newmarket trial ground. Laura Oakes and Katherine Watt of the mail order division were the winners with this rather splendid version of Dougal from The Magic Roundabout.

 

Though, I suspect, if I'd been there, I'd have voted for this rather ingenious character by the trial ground team of Carol Parsons, Brian Talman and Todor Paskalev:

 

 

The Invisible Man won second place

 

Commercial director Tim Jeffries' swagger of a pirate won third.

 

 

Though rumour has it that this fellow might possibly be the work of children from a Hertfordshire primary school...  Oh, Tim!

London's Secret Garden: Plant Portraits by the Florilegium Society at Chelsea Physic Garden

Any excuse for a visit to Chelsea Physic Garden is a good one, but the current exhibition, London's Secret Garden, to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the Florilegium Society won't disappoint.

Curcubita ficifolia by Kimiko Kambe-Gang

About the Florilegium Society

Set up in 1995 to record the plants in the garden, after a botanical art course run on site by The English Gardening School gave the students the desire to continue painting, it has only sixty members at any one time. Members visit the garden regularly and the society's Chairman, Dugald Graham-Campbell explained, with a twinkle in his eye, "In return for the kudos for being asked to be a member, you are expected to paint something from the garden each year."

The Society aims to catalogue every plant in the garden eventually, which is quite a task, given that there are five thousand different plants and their collection currently boasts 650 paintings. Combine this with the fact that, in reality, about thirty-five pictures are submitted in time for acceptance each year - and there's work for years to come.

Each November, submitted pictures are judged by an independent panel which includes doctors of botany from Kew and the curator of Chelsea Physic Garden. Artistic merit isn't considered; acceptance depends on whether a picture is scientifically accurate enough to be accepted.

Calendula officinalis by Dana Everett

The demands of botanical painting

Seventy-five pictures are on display in the current exhibition. The pictures are entrancing in their detail. Botanical art differs from flower painting in being strictly scientific in intent, providing an accurate record of the plant, sufficient for ID purposes. So, no vases, no insects, no dewdrops - though sometimes an artist just can't help herself on the latter (and yes, the majority of members are women).

Past chairman Judi Stone explained the finer points of the art and it became clear that, with too much artistic licence, you'd probably end up with a flower painting.  "If stems cross, it could be unclear and messy," explained Judi, pointing out the separate seedhead of the Calendula illustrated above.

Of course, rules are there to be broken and skilful artists manage it well. In another picture, an aubergine overlapped a slice of the fruit, cleverly linking the two, but nevertheless clearly separate. "You can see a very thin white edge has been left between the two to indicate separation," said Judi.

Yet, within such strictures there is remarkable artistry, not just in the accurate rendition of colour and shape, but, by clever placement, in making a subject feel anchored and its parts united on the page when there is no background to set it against.

If the demands of botanical art seem to put it far out of your artistic range, it's encouraging to find that the discipline can be an entry into painting. Gill Barlow, who is the society's archivist and has taught in her time, explained that you can teach people to see, to measure with compasses for accurate rendition, and to create a design. (She sketches the elements on pieces of tracing paper and arranges them to her satisfaction, before starting the actual work.)

Urtica dioica by Nicki Tullett

The artists have considerable freedom to work as they please. Some use watercolours (with a dry-brush technique to ensure accurate lines and colours), others pen and ink or pencil (145 pictures in the collection are in black and white). One in the exhibition (you're unlikely to spot which) is in coloured pencils. Paper can be of different textures; one uses vellum.

Do we need botanical art?

Isn't all this painstaking attention to detail rather an indulgence in this day of the digital camera? Andrew Brown, who wrote the accompanying book, Botanical Illustration from Chelsea Physic Garden, explained, "Botanical art has advantages over photos. Everything that is required for diagnosis of a plant is on the same page. You could put a whole lot of photographs together, but not everything would be in focus. The business of focus - that's the main point."

What botanical art certainly does is make the viewer focus. For some, the idea of concentrating so minutely (even through a microscope, for those artists who wish) is a dry view of nature. Yet, the enormous service provided by such painstaking efforts is it gives us, the viewers, a chance see the plants anew, and gain a greater appreciation through seeing with another's eyes. Even the dreaded Horsetail, an absolute bete noire of mine, and portrayed in tiny  monochrome pencil strokes by Guy Eves, received my grudging admiration.

London's Secret Garden information

The Chelsea Physic Garden exhibition is open until August 26th, from 11 to 4, free with entrance to the garden. On a Monday, the cafe and shop are not open and 2-for-1 offers are not valid. The exhibition is only accessible via stairs. 

This is the first time that the Garden has taken on the reproduction of products arising from the Florilegium Society. Six prints, fridge magnets, magnetic bookmarks and a scarf, featuring botanical art that can be seen in the exhibition, can be purchased from the shop.

 

Gigantomo advice - how to grow big tomatoes

Mine's bigger than yours. Is there something in our DNA that makes humans want to make things really, really big? It's a spirit that's thriving in the City of London, with proposals recently announced for a new building only 5m shorter than the Shard. And there'll be plenty of rivalry at Harrogate Autumn Flower Show 18-20th September, when a new class will be judged on Giant Vegetables.

Included in the competition are the National Gigantomo Championships. The prize at stake is pretty big itself, unlike most veggie show rewards - £1000 prize for the heaviest tomato, with £5000 added if it breaks the world record at the time of the show. That record is currently 7lb 12oz (it was a 'Delicious' tomato).

*Rapidly calculates*  That's something in the region of 3.5 bags of sugar in weight - and probably bulkier because a bag of sugar is denser than a tomato.

Blimey.

Now, I was lucky enough to receive five Gigantomo plug plants from Van Meuwen, this year. Told of their giant dimensions, I raised a sceptical eyebrow. "But do they taste any good?" I queried, with what I hoped was a suitably chummy, ho-ho-we-all-know-the-problem-with-this-sort-of-thing tone of voice. The charming young man at the Press Event in February took it on the chin (it was late afternoon. Of course he hadn't been asked this before) and assured me that, actually, they taste very good.

All five are in the Tomato Growing Position - front of house, full sun, south-facing. Growing strongly. But I'll just reassure any competitively minded Gigantomo growers out there that the chances of my getting my mitts on the £6000 (or even £1000) are vanishingly small.

The strain has already made enough of a splash to have been reported in the Mail Online. These plants, the article says, will grow to six feet. Hmm. Not in my buckets, I fear. These have proved totally adequate for tomatoes up to now, but I sense disappointment in their current residents. The plants wilt with alarming rapidity, even after a darn good soaking the evening before. A watering twice a day seems to be what they're demanding.

How to Grow Big Tomatoes

However, for anyone who is more optimistic than I, Van Meuwen have sent out helpful instructions on how to grow the biggest tomatoes. It would apply to all tomato plants, pretty much. Bob Flowerdew said on BBC Radio Four's Gardeners' Question Time recently that the weight of fruit (on an apple tree, in his instance) will remain constant, whether you thin down the fruit or not, meaning that the more ruthless you are with thinning, the larger the fruit you'll grow. It only remains to ask yourself, How big do I want my tomatoes?

The megablooms seem to come on an extra thick stalk

That aside, this is what needs doing:

1. Understand megablooms. It's a blossom that's got more flower petals than the others because it's made up of two or more blossoms. This is the tomato that will grow and grow, because it's actually two or more tomatoes fused together. (Every Gigantomo truss seems to have a megabloom. On mine, it seems to start off on a twisted stalk that gradually uncurls. You should keep only four trusses on each plant.
2. Allow only four trusses per plant.
3. Thin these down to one tomato per truss (obviously, with Gigantamo this should be the megabloom tomato, but I've noticed that this has happened naturally on a lot of the trusses. Quite a few blooms have aborted, leaving one tomato to grow.)
4. Apply a mulch of manure up to four inches deep, if grown in soil, or as much as possible around the top of the container.
5. Stake strongly. It's also suggested that you cage the plants with chicken wire. (I prefer that green-coated wire fencing that Americans call "dog-wire". It allows the tomato leaves to poke out through the large rectangular holes. Even so, one of the cages has already toppled over and I've had to tie it to the wall behind.)
6. Support individual fruit with an old stocking, or anything that creates a little hammock for it.
7. Give them constant moisture to avoid blossom end rot (oh, dear).
8. Feed weekly - and foliar feed twice weekly with seaweed solution. (Gigantomo not only drink like topers, but eat like gluttons.)

All this should give you something to attract the judges' attention at any veggie show.

Gigantomo tomato plant, caged in as an alternative to staki

As I say, unless something very surprising happens over the next few weeks, my tomatoes will be no threat to anyone. My aim is to grow larger than average tomatoes and hope they taste good. However, if your eye is glinting at the goal of riches, here's what to do if your Gigantomo looks like a winner:

Picking a Show-Winning Giant Tomato

Measure your potential prize-winner until it stops swelling and then pick it when still pinkish, unless the competition is imminent. If it ripens far too early, pick and keep in the fridge for up to three weeks at 8-10 C.

Good luck!

For a follow-up on the competition and what I thought of my crop, see my later post Gigantomo tomatoes taste update.

Hampton Court Flower Show 2015: going round in circles

This year's Hampton Court Flower Show has been, as I said in the last post, all arcs and anniversaries. The circle has arrived with a vengeance. Straight lines are still in evidence, but I fear they'll soon be as scarce as curves once were. Here are the arcs:

I don't think you could have got more circles into Living Landscapes City Twitchers by Sarah Keyser of Coucou Designs. It also had willow, Egyptian Limestone, sedum turf, a chamomile lawn and a Prunus Tai Haku - because its spreading branches are easy to hang (round) bird feeders in. (Won Silver Gilt.)

Round planters, curved seat (in bleached oak to match the bleached wood behind) and...(we're not finished)...

...a different round planter and balls in Rae Wilkinson's blue-toned Living Landscapes HUG (Healing Urban Garden). (Won Silver Gilt.)

Two circles joined by a line, with a small round pond - Ready...Aim...Flower! (Won Silver)

Excuse me while I digress a moment:

Designer Simon Webster, I was told by another designer, had a lot of stick for including a gun. "No, I haven't," he said. "People have been able to look past that." Anyway...

...look at the fun you could have with it. Concept? The journey from being under a destructive influence to gaining recovery. Moral of garden? Don't put too much black ink in your pond - it leaks into the render above.

 

SABO: THe Circle of Life, designed by Stefano Passerotti. It's all in the name, really. The cork oak was lovely.The Travertine paving was gorgeous. The sound of water was soothing. The planting was delicate. I thought it less than the sum of its parts. (Won Silver Gilt.)

 

Squire's Garden Centres: Urban Oasis. A curve leading to a round, with another round table.

Another digression:

 

Remember Squire's garden last year? It was the first time they'd done a garden designed by people within the firm. This year's designer Ian Hammond said it wasn't naturalistic enough, it didn't flow and colours clashed (which judges don't like, apparently).

 

Ian said they'd learned a lot. "Give yourself plenty of time. You don't appreciate how many plants are needed. Be patient with it. The sooner you get your plants in, the better, so they can fill out."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I thought they'd created a charming, relaxed garden, even if it still only got Silver Gilt.

 Back to the arc (as Noah said when the first raindrop fell):

Anne-Marie Powell balanced curved paths and these curved steps and round seats with plank paving of various sizes.

One of only two of the main show gardens to gain Gold.

The Wellbeing of Women designed by Wendy van Buren, Claire Moreno and Amy Robertson. A curved path to a round patio. Incidentally, inked water was very much in this year - I guess designers like it 'cos you can't see the debris collecting in the bottom. (Won Silver Gilt.)

 

A polite courtyard - Great Gardens of the USA, Charleston by Sadie May Stowell for Brand USA (Won Silver)

I'd show you the Vestra Wealth Garden - curved path, round amphitheatre, but I think we've just had too many circles. Anyway, someone got in the way when I was trying to photograph it.

Finally, an accolade to Sarah Harris of the DialaFlight Synaesthesia Garden. No arcs and, to be honest, while the idea was interesting, the tent itself wasn't that exciting - white flowers lit by colours cycling on a loop.

But on the first day of the build, Sarah's 34-year-old partner had a stroke and was hospitalised in Leeds. She spent a week up there and only had a week to build the garden. You have to hand it to her that she managed a garden at all. She must have felt as if she was rushing aound in circles.

 

Hampton Court Flower Show 2015: arcs and anniversaries

I began to think this year's Hampton Court Flower Show was going round in circles. Literally. The curve that wriggled its way into Chelsea this year has felt peckish and bitten its tail. Circles are all over the place. (But more of that later.)

Anniversaries are equally abundant. Most prominent, of course, Hampton Court Flower Show, apparently amazed to find itself 25 years old:

RHS Anniversary Maze celebrating 25 years of the show, Hampton Court 2015

Though, you'd have been hard put to get lost inside...

...there was an unexpected encounter:

Nearby, Rolawn had commissioned Tony Smith to create a massive turf sculpture to celebrate 40 years as turf growers and promote their Keep on the Grass campaign. Rolawn's Emily Kirkland said, "I can't see into the bottom. Anything might be there." (It wasn't.)

They also provided my one and only glass of bubbly for the day. Thank you, Rolawn!

More greenery at Agrumi's We're All Mad Here!, where they were celebrating 150 years of continuous publication of Alice in Wonderland:

 

Agrumi - they specialise in topiary, in case you were wondering

Alice also inspired The Tea Party, designed by Charlie Bloom (she in the dress below).

 

It was full of lovely little touches...

...and was the sort of formal small garden that Charlie, who carries out restoration on private historic gardens, would like to see more of.

The judges didn't feel the same and only awarded Bronze, though she had wondered if they'd approve of the "madness" of the shaggy box hedges. (I guess not.)

Who else had an anniversary? Oh, yes!

Next door to The Tea Party was Botanica World of Discoveries Winnie the Pooh Begins his Journey, referring to the 90th anniversary of the Bear's first appearance in 1925.

It was cute:

And I liked the exuberant wildflower turf roof:

It didn't quite have enough magic for me (and when on earth did Piglet look like that?) - a problem, I guess, when you're conjuring up people's childhood reading.  Still, once again Helen finds herself staring blankly at the judging - it won Gold and Best Historic Garden.

Also in this strange little section - an orphan row which, IMHO, should be marched firmly over to the other side of the water with the rest of the gardens - was Amnesty International Magna Carta 800 garden.

Cool, inviting...

...and very yellow. (The colour was paler at the back, getting stronger towards the front, referring to the progress of human rights. In the picture below I think it makes the garden look bigger - sneaky!)

One of the "new" Flower Boxes got on that particular bandwagon. DCCC by Stuart Meeson - go to his website for a fascinating intimation of why he might have chosen this shape - subconsciously, of course.)

If you still haven't spotted its anniversary, go to the back of the class.

In comparison, Scotty's Little Soldier garden was almost still in nappies, celebrating a mere five years in the charity's existence.

 

Not easy to photograph, but I like the way the shadows break up the wide path - necessary as Graeme Thirde designed it as a walk-through garden (of which there should be more). The ribbons?

 

Printed with messages from children who have lost their father.

You wouldn't think there could be many anniversaries left, but no...

The Queen Elizabeth Foundation is celebrating its 80th anniversary and the garden represents the life-changing work it undertakes.  It won Gold and Best Summer Garden. Again, I was a bit bemused by the Best award, as it looked a bit like the sort of corner you find at the end of a garden where its been nicely finished but nothing happens. The mirrors were cleverly placed - it took me a moment to realise they were there.

Back to history: Waterloo (200 years) made a reappearance (after Chelsea this year) with the Hougoumont Farms Kitchen Garden (annoyingly I missed it) and Vestra Wealth: Encore - A Music Lover's Garden combined inspiration from its being 500 years since building began on Hampton Court Palace and from the fact that Handel's Water Music was played on the Thames (which runs past etc) - although that debuted in 1717 (another near miss).

What you couldn't miss, though, was the huge cake Vertigarten Celebration Cake - 3456 plants in Vertigarten modules.

I thought I recognised it. I first saw it last year when I visited Ball Colegrave:

Preferred the planting last year, but you have to admit the surroundings don't have the same power to...

(Yes, it's a scarecrow in a rowing boat. No, I'm not sure, either.)