DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16633#0423
Modern English Gardening
the configuration of the ground, the soil, the vast extent, and the short period in which
everything has been accomplished. Nature gave a flat surface and stubborn London clay;
art has produced range and elevation in infinite variety and an amenable earth abounding
m fertility. Moreover, this wonder-garden equals in area the combined parks of many an
important town. Unexcelled as a work of pure art, a storehouse for thousands of orna-
mental plants which are now unknown but are likely to possess great artistic and commercial
value in the future, a birthplace and testing-station for numerous utilitarian members of
the kitchen-garden, almost equally important artistically and educationally, Aldenham
stands for English gardening in its highest, its greatest phase.
THE PLEASAUNCE, OVERSTRAND
Among the gardens on the eastern seaboard of England, where the great East Anglian
shoulder thrusts out into the North Sea, there are few which can compare in beauty with
The Pleasaunce, that exquisite gem of horticulture founded by the late Lord Battersea
a few miles from Cromer.
One recalls one's first visit, when the man who called it into being, famous alike as
politician, sportsman and artist, himself acted as guide, and afterwards quietly asked a
guest still struggling with his impressions and emotions to suggest improvements. In reply
one could speak only of learning, not of teaching.
The Pleasaunce was, and remains, an artist's garden. It was the original, the finished
work of a man on whose walls hung some of the best paintings of Botticelli, Leonardo da
Vinci, Moroni, Burne-Jones, Bassano, Rubens, and Whistler; a man to whom the import-
ance of line, form and colour was a law. Cyril Flower had brought both training and
imagination to bear on the task which he had set himself. Despite this, he was not troubled
by horticultural tradition. It was nothing to him that seventeenth-century architects and
landscape gardeners had tied themselves to severe axial lines, terraces, elaborate water-
devices, fountains and statuary, for these things were not art as he understood it. He had
no sympathy, indeed, with the formal system as such. His respect for form did not blind
him to the demands of Nature. He could not visualise the garden as a mere appanage of
the house, although he was quite prepared to associate the two in harmonious ways. Above
all things he set before himself the task of making a garden which should be beautiful in
all its parts—a garden that conformed to the laws of art in line and colour and yet was
entirely informal, creative, stimulating and original. He achieved success in a very remark-
able degree—so much so, indeed, that The Pleasaunce became one of the 1 distinctive
gardens of modern England.
It remains a private possession, but just as, in mediaeval times, the great nobles of
Italy threw open their grounds to the public, so, in these days, do many liberal-minded
proprietors of English gardens give the people access to them on stated occasions. Garden-
lovers may, therefore, visit The Pleasaunce at particular times, as they may the royal
gardens at Sandringham a few miles away; and one can hardly imagine a more pleasant
and inspiring pilgrimage than that which is made to embrace both these beautiful places.
Visitors to The Pleasaunce will find roses, hardy herbaceous plants, alpines, shrubs
and aquatics used with equal taste and skill. They will see delightful pergolas, loggias and
the configuration of the ground, the soil, the vast extent, and the short period in which
everything has been accomplished. Nature gave a flat surface and stubborn London clay;
art has produced range and elevation in infinite variety and an amenable earth abounding
m fertility. Moreover, this wonder-garden equals in area the combined parks of many an
important town. Unexcelled as a work of pure art, a storehouse for thousands of orna-
mental plants which are now unknown but are likely to possess great artistic and commercial
value in the future, a birthplace and testing-station for numerous utilitarian members of
the kitchen-garden, almost equally important artistically and educationally, Aldenham
stands for English gardening in its highest, its greatest phase.
THE PLEASAUNCE, OVERSTRAND
Among the gardens on the eastern seaboard of England, where the great East Anglian
shoulder thrusts out into the North Sea, there are few which can compare in beauty with
The Pleasaunce, that exquisite gem of horticulture founded by the late Lord Battersea
a few miles from Cromer.
One recalls one's first visit, when the man who called it into being, famous alike as
politician, sportsman and artist, himself acted as guide, and afterwards quietly asked a
guest still struggling with his impressions and emotions to suggest improvements. In reply
one could speak only of learning, not of teaching.
The Pleasaunce was, and remains, an artist's garden. It was the original, the finished
work of a man on whose walls hung some of the best paintings of Botticelli, Leonardo da
Vinci, Moroni, Burne-Jones, Bassano, Rubens, and Whistler; a man to whom the import-
ance of line, form and colour was a law. Cyril Flower had brought both training and
imagination to bear on the task which he had set himself. Despite this, he was not troubled
by horticultural tradition. It was nothing to him that seventeenth-century architects and
landscape gardeners had tied themselves to severe axial lines, terraces, elaborate water-
devices, fountains and statuary, for these things were not art as he understood it. He had
no sympathy, indeed, with the formal system as such. His respect for form did not blind
him to the demands of Nature. He could not visualise the garden as a mere appanage of
the house, although he was quite prepared to associate the two in harmonious ways. Above
all things he set before himself the task of making a garden which should be beautiful in
all its parts—a garden that conformed to the laws of art in line and colour and yet was
entirely informal, creative, stimulating and original. He achieved success in a very remark-
able degree—so much so, indeed, that The Pleasaunce became one of the 1 distinctive
gardens of modern England.
It remains a private possession, but just as, in mediaeval times, the great nobles of
Italy threw open their grounds to the public, so, in these days, do many liberal-minded
proprietors of English gardens give the people access to them on stated occasions. Garden-
lovers may, therefore, visit The Pleasaunce at particular times, as they may the royal
gardens at Sandringham a few miles away; and one can hardly imagine a more pleasant
and inspiring pilgrimage than that which is made to embrace both these beautiful places.
Visitors to The Pleasaunce will find roses, hardy herbaceous plants, alpines, shrubs
and aquatics used with equal taste and skill. They will see delightful pergolas, loggias and