The weekend of 16th and 17th February the garden at The Old Rectory in Boreham is open for the first time in springtime, as part of the National Garden Scheme (NGS).
This garden is owned by Sir Jeffery and Lady Bowman a couple who have lived there for more than forty years in an Elizabethan, 15th century house with grounds that overlook the Chelmer and Blackwater valley.
These days there is a growing awareness about encouraging native species, the spring flowers on show are crocus, snowdrops and cyclamen. Are these native species?
Snowdrops have always grown in that part of Essex, whereas cyclamen are from Europe and the Mediterranean and not specifically the United Kingdom. On the other hand the crocus was first cultivated in Crete, and was introduced into the Netherlands in the 1560s.
Many gardeners strive to have their show-piece accepted by the NGS, who publish the year's open gardens in The Yellow Book, soon to be available for 2011.
Little Cumbre, Exeter, Devon opens the 13th and 20th February. Dr Margaret Lloyd the owner told the BBC that 'some people would be out there with hair dryers trying to wake their snowdrops up - don’t laugh, it’s happened - but it’s a sign of the strength of planning behind this garden that such setbacks don’t matter a jot'.
But what of the countrywide scheme that makes this possible? When somebody says National gardens it conjures up other similar names, like the National Portrait Gallery, or the National Theatre because it sounds very establishment, very organised and almost certainly dating from the Victorian age and connected to the memory of Prince Albert.
The NGS is in fact a charity, formed a little later than Queen Victoria that is in 1927 with the aim of 'opening gardens of quality, character and interest to the public for charity' (wikipedia). The idea was to raise money for pension support for district nurses. They were to charge a 'shilling a head' for a garden visit.
While garden visiting was popular among a privileged few now everyone was able to enjoy it for a fee that went to a good cause.
Gardens of that era are still on show; Sissinghurst Castle Garden created by the writer Vita Sackville-West and her husband Sir Harold Nicolson with the famous White Garden. Or the Hidcote Manor Garden also with a white garden and the form of linking types of garden 'rooms'. With plants from all over the world, they were eye-catching.
Will your favourite spring flowers be visible this coming weekend. This is the time to find out by making a trip to one or two. Are any Landscape Juice readers opening a garden in the NGS? If so, it would be wonderful to find out more about them.
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