Grand Tour - Great Dixter

It rained all morning, while we were shown around Christopher Lloyd's garden at Great Dixter. We were taken through the garden by one of the most delightful young ladies you can possibly imagine. Her name is Rachel, and she is one of the senior gardeners at GD. Her enthusiasm for the garden, the way in which it is gardened (keeping the spirit of Christopher Lloyd going by Head Gardener Fergus Garrett) and her passion for the plants and everything about the place, was totally irresistible. I just loved her. She stood in the pouring rain with a big smile on her face, enthusing about everything. A very inspiring young lady, who made sure we enjoyed our soggy tour around the garden.

You can learn more about Great Dixter here http://www.greatdixter.co.uk It's a beautiful house, a significant part of which was designed by Edwin Lutyens, around 1911, and seamlessly tacked on to a 15th century house.

The early autumn garden is full of interest, with lots of colour, beautiful seedheads, and Great Dixter is absolutely crammed with plants! If things want to self-seed, they are allowed to get on with it, which gives the planting a lovely loose feeling, abundant and generous.

I loved this mix of fig leaves and the wild clematis, traveller's joy - or old man's beard, as I have always known it.

The exotic garden was positively tropical! It was hard to imagine we were in East Sussex with banana palms and tropical plants touring over our heads, and dripping raindrops down our necks!

Great Dixter is also known for its use of planting in flowerpots. The arrangements are redesigned every three weeks or so, which keeps things fresh and interesting.

Finally the sun came out, and I went round the garden again. What a glorious place!

Comments

In a vase on Monday - colour

The intense colours in my vase this week come from nasturtiums, sweetpeas and a single glorious zinnia! Their beauty and love of life speak for themselves and need no further words from me! Enjoy!

Colonsay postcards - on arrival

The first thing I do, once we have unpacked our car, which has been groaning with all the stuff we need for a week's stay in the holiday cottage, is head for the outer gardens of Colonsay House. It is a place of wonder for me! I particularly love the leaves of the giant rhododendrons. There are many different varieties, all planted in the early 1930s. The outer gardens are generally overgrown, having had little tending over the decades. That makes them even more magical! The old woodmill falls apart a little more every year, but that's fine by me because I love corrugated iron and especially if it's rusted! And of course the bees. Colonsay's beekeeper, Andrew Abrahams, has one of his apiaries on the edge of the pine wood. So lovely - the hum of busy bees and the heady smell of the pines. We are here - finally! Delayed by four months by the wretched virus, but now I am on holiday! Hooray!

Found items IAVOM

I am on holiday on the Inner Hebridean island of Colonsay. It is my happy place. Thoughts of Colonsay rattle around in my head each and every day I am not here! I haven't got a vase to share this week but some lovely things I have found over the past few days, which are just as beautiful as a vase of flowers! I hope you agree! Here are some leaves of giant rhododendrons, growing in the outer gardens of Colonsay House. Some skeleton leaves of magnolia. The dried stem of a kelp seaweed. A couple of conkers (can never resist those!), and a branch heavily populated by a number of lichens. The air on Colonsay is so clean that lichens flourish here!

the running wave

Search This Blog