Yesterday Chap and I took a day off work and spent the day at Stourhead with Elizabeth, a family friend of old, and her friend Sue. The day started gloomily, with dark lowering clouds and heavy rain showers. But we were so lucky: the sun came out and the rain held off, although the impressive clouds remained. Sue hadn’t visited Stourhead before, so it was a joy seeing her delight at meeting this stunning garden for the first time.
I’ll let the photos do the talking. Click on any to embiggen/bigify:
Stourhead: The Palladian Bridge and in the background, the Pantheon.
Stourhead: The view from the Temple of Apollo. The colours are so zingy at this time of year, and the rhododendrons and azaleas were looking amazing.
Stourhead: The Temple of Apollo. The lake is off to the left of shot.
Stourhead: The Temple of Flora, the Palladian Bridge and the Bristol Cross photographed from outside the Pantheon.
Stourhead: Inside the Pantheon.
Stourhead: The deliberately wonky, shonky windows of the Gothic Cottage.
Stourhead: The memory board within the Gothic Cottage.
Stourhead: A lovely note pinned on the memory board. Ah, huge congratulations to Ben and Vicki.
Stourhead: Naughty Grace!
Stourhead: View across the lake to the Temple of Apollo.
Stourhead: Gaudy rhododendrons and azaleas among the acers and other trees.
Stourhead: View from outside the Temple of Flora to the Pantheon.
Stourhead: The Palladian Bridge from the Temple of Flora.
Stourhead: Big skies over the lake and the Pantheon.
Cottages and the National Trust estate office at the village of Stourton, just outside the Stourhead landscape gardens.
And this is the view from just by those cottages: the Bristol Cross, the Palladian Bridge and the Pantheon.
Stourton Church, viewed from the same spot as the previous photograph.
Stourhead: National Trust gardeners training some young fruit trees in the walled kitchen gardens. Allium ‘Purple Sensation’ popping up between lavender within box hedges in the foreground.
Stourhead: The restored glasshouse with the beautiful collection of species and variety pelargoniums.
Stourhead: A wonderful bee, insect and small critter hotel made out of pallets, old terracotta roof tiles, ridge tiles and drainage pipes with bamboo, among other things, against a wall in the walled garden.
Stourhead; Rosa banksiae ‘Lutea’ with its tiny yellow pompom flowers growing against an outbuilding. Gorgeous.
And watching the Chelsea Flower Show coverage on the Beeb yesterday evening after our return, what do I hear but architecture critic and broadcaster Tom Dyckhoff say this:
‘In fact, I would go so far as to say that the greatest contribution that Britain has made to worldwide design has been the landscape garden and its relationship to architecture. I mean particularly from the classic periods, the late 18th century, that kind of period of picturesque garden design, places like Stourhead. That was arguably our greatest design moment, certainly our greatest contribution.’
(edited slightly to remove ‘you knows’ and ‘like’s)
I couldn’t agree more. And we are so lucky to live so close and to be able to visit its wonders frequently.