Thursday 31 December 2015

Happy New Year.














A gardener is by nature an optimistic person, next year is always going to be better than last year.
May all your garden plans and New Year wishes come true and all your Resolutions be upheld.

These twelve pictures have all appeared in Our Garden@19 during the year.
Please click on any one to create a slide show.

Tuesday 22 December 2015

Merry Christmas.





From the 'Our Garden@19' team.
Thank you for visiting the blog and leaving your comments during the year, I have enjoyed reading them.

Saturday 12 December 2015

Aberglasney (Part 1) The Gardens.


      I wrote in a previous blog about an enjoyable holiday in the lovely town of Laugharne, Carmarthenshire,  Here.
 I promised then to blog about some of the gardens we visited, during our time there.
      This is one of them,
      The Aberglasney Garden. The quote below is from their website: http://www.aberglasney.org

"Spectacularly set in the beautiful Tywi valley of Carmarthenshire, Aberglasney House features one of the finest gardens in Wales. Aberglasney Gardens have been an inspiration to poets since 1477. The story of Aberglasney spans many centuries, but, the house's origins are still shrouded in obscurity.

Aberglasney Restoration Trust

While Aberglasney’s very existence was unknown to the world in general (many local people remaining unaware of it), a small band of enthusiasts of historic houses and gardens had long kept an informal watching brief on the property, noting its decline with increasing concern.
Eventually they formed the Trust, and at the eleventh hour realized their ambitions to save Aberglasney when an American benefactor donated the purchase price. This primed the pump for a gruelling series of feasibility studies and grant applications to give Aberglasney a new lease of life.
The ambitious restoration strategy has drawn on the skills of experts in many spheres. All available sources were examined to uncover Aberglasney’s history, but much remained (and still remains) unknown. Only when repairs were well underway and the stone structures made safe could major archaeology begin.
Findings in 1998-1999 proved that the Cloister garden did indeed date from the late Tudor and early Stewart era. The process of discovery continues, just as the exciting new plantings grow into place bringing new life to old spaces.
Aberglasney is changing and growing - a garden lost in time no longer, a garden of past, present and future."

The Cloister Garden looking towards the house.

 

The cloister garden is surrounded on three sides by a broad parapet walkway.



The border in front of the house was planted with a colourful blend of annuals.


Looking towards the gatehouse.


The walk way provides wonderful views from around the garden, this one is looking down onto the pool garden.




Looking across the pool to the vine covered wall, which originally supported a victorian vine house...


Now planted with colourful, dahlias...



...Canna's, calendula and Cerinthe major. 


There is a walled vegetable garden, containing this impressive Malus sargentii covered walkway,  growing vegetables, herbs and cut flowers.


The upper walled garden was designed by Penelope Hobhouse, it is a garden of concentric ovals set in an oblong walled garden.


There are several stream side woodland walks, this one with beautifully constructed bridges...


...Hydrangeas were in full flower when we visited...



...when you reach the top you can sit and relax within this oriental pergola.


I was impressed with all the different gardens at Aberglasney, the one that crowned them all for me was the sunken garden containing a pool...


...with a spherical water feature...


...the Kniphofia were in full flower...


...beautifully reflected in the pool.
A real sanctuary to sit and relax in.


The Yew Tunnel is thought to have been planted during the 18th Century, when they had grown tall enough they were bent over to form an arch.


The gardens at Aberglasney continue to develop, this year they were awarded almost £1Million from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

"Aberglasney Gardens in Carmarthenshire has received almost a million pounds from the Heritage Lottery Fund for a project to create a new heritage horticulture training facility at the historic gardens.

The project aims to provide inspiration and training for a new generation of gardeners as well as students with learning difficulties and school children and is the latest in a line of restoration projects at Aberglasney.

The facility will be housed in a group of derelict farm buildings on the site, once the piggeries of Aberglasney Home Farm. As well as restoring the traditional buildings, there are also plans for a spectacular new greenhouse."  Quote from their website.

If you are have the opportunity to visit Aberglasney, please do you will not be disappointed, there is an excellent cafe and plant sales area.

Please click on any picture to create a slide show.

Saturday 28 November 2015

The Golden Globe Award!

 One tree I would always make room for in a garden is a Malus (Crab Apple).
The one in Our Garden@19 is Malus 'Golden Hornet', which I planted after reading 
Rosemary Verey's recommendation in her book 'The Garden in Winter'.

Once mature, I have always pruned it to maintain the bowl shape you see below, in blossom...


...this photo shows it with fruit and new growth, that would have been pruned back during the winter.
We visited Highgrove Garden (sorry about the name drop) in 2014 and I noticed, in the vegetable garden, the Malus Golden Hornets ( Rosemary Verey advised Prince Charles in the early years) had been trained into a coronet shape.


I thought a coronet was a little too pretentious for here, whereas a globe would be acceptable.
Instead of cutting off all the new growth, I tied the majority in together to form the basic shape and then spur pruned the remainder as usual.
This picture shows the pruning finished with some of the old fruit still on, which is left for the birds during the cold weather.
The one drawback with 'Golden Hornet' is the yellow fruit turn brown during the winter. 


Looking better in the spring with some leaf growth...


...and even better when in blossom...


...which is a very attractive flower.


In summer the apples develop...


...the lovely colour from which the name is derived...


...thereby creating a Golden Globe...



...and some where to hang two bird feeders.


...The Golden Globe illuminated at night.


One of the joys of visiting other gardens, however large or small, is that they can be a source of inspiration.

We will be opening Our Garden@19 again next year for the NGS. Their yellow book is a great source of gardens open to visit throughout the UK.
What have you been inspired to create after a garden visit?

Please click on any picture to create a slide show.

Monday 23 November 2015

In a Vase on Monday. 23/11/15





Sunday's glorious weather gave me the opportunity to finally complete my bulb and wallflower planting for this year.

While enjoying the sunshine I collected a few flowers for today's In a Vase on Monday.


The Worcestershire Weeping Standard Rose has taken on a new lease of life and started flowering again and...


...joining it in the vase are the annuals, Calendula officials and Centaurea cyanus ‘Blue Boy.'
The foliage is provided by Erica arb. 'Albert's Gold', I do like its acid green colour, along with fallen leaves from the Liquidamber slyraciflua 'Stella'.
I have added some pine cones, from our neighbours trees, that came down in the recent gale 'Barney'.


The Worcestershire Rose.


Please visit Cathy at Rambling in the Garden Here to see what other bloggers have In a Vase on Monday.

Please click on any photo to create a slide show.

Monday 16 November 2015

November Colour?


The weather recently has not been conducive to strolling around the garden. 
Venturing out on Sunday to check for any wind damage and relieved to find everything intact, I fetched the camera to record what was flowering here in November. 
The Cobaea scandens, which I have posted about before, is still rampantly growing in all directions. This stem is half way up through the cherry tree by the patio. the majority of the blooms have been purple, it is nice to see some white ones.


The other rampant annuals are the Nasturtiums, this one has self sown from last year.


The Hakonechloa macro 'Aureola' adds a splash of bright green in a pot on the patio...


...also in a pot is the non stop flowering Geranium 'Rozanne'.


The evergreen Viburnum tinus provides a flowering screen to the water buts at this time of year.


Through the Vitis 'Spectchley Red' covered arch...


...to the mixed border where the late flowering Eupatorium macula. 'Chocolate', with its chocolate coloured leaves and white flowers...


...and the Hydrangea 'Blue Wave', whose white flowers have a faint hint of blue in our soil, providing the only flower colour in this area.


It is amazing when walking around your own garden, how you can miss a plant in flower, I suddenly noticed the flowers on the Viburnum f 'candidissimum'...


...I  don't think I have seen so many flowers on it before...


...close to the buds are little, tight clusters of scent.


Writing a garden blog, along with taking photos, encourages you to look closer at your garden, it is easy to just go out and work in your own garden and not stop to look around.
I have observed since writing about Our Garden@19 how some colours appear to dominate at different times of year.
In these photos white is, perhaps, surprisingly the main colour.


What colour dominates your garden at this time of year?

Please click on any photo to create a slide show.