- 2 weeks ago
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00:00.
00:15You coming?
00:16Come on in. Let's go.
00:18Come on in, boy.
00:30I've been away for a much-needed break.
00:35But you know, when you're travelling back home,
00:37you have that moment of,
00:39what's the garden going to be like?
00:42And actually, we've had a little bit of good news.
00:45And some not so.
00:47The wind has knocked a few things over,
00:49so this Artemisia has just collapsed.
00:52So that's easy.
00:54We can stake that one up.
00:57But look at this in front of me.
00:59This is Salix Magnifica.
01:02Which, let's be honest,
01:03is not looking quite so magnificent at the moment.
01:06But before I went away,
01:08because we'd had so much dry,
01:10I thought I'd lost it.
01:11But I've come back,
01:12and that rain that we've had has played its part
01:15because there's signs of growth.
01:18And I think the lesson from that,
01:20especially the season that we've had,
01:23is let's not be too quick to write things off.
01:28All I do is go out and just start to sort of scratch the bark,
01:33see if there's any signs of life.
01:35And you see green, it wants to fight on, eh?
01:39As I've said, nature is a wonderful thing.
01:41What I'm going to do is tidy off these brown leaves,
01:45because it looks better more than anything.
01:49Anyway, we've got plenty to get on with today.
01:52France is in West Yorkshire to see the most extraordinary garden.
01:58What makes this truly remarkable is that it's a private garden.
02:02It's the work of just one man.
02:05And this is just the front garden.
02:08We meet a litigator turned propagator
02:12who's created a beautiful sanctuary from the world.
02:16I was a litigation lawyer, which involves arguing.
02:20And I don't really like arguing.
02:22And the nice thing about gardening is there's no-one to argue with.
02:25The plants just do their own thing, and I do my own thing,
02:27and I absolutely love it.
02:30Advely immerses herself in the romance and intrigue
02:34of a garden designed by Vita Sackrell West
02:38and her husband, Harold.
02:40Their marriage was a safe harbour
02:43and the affairs were mere ports of call.
02:47And walking through this garden,
02:49you can sense the balance of Vita and Harold's personalities.
02:55And a chef turned gardener showcases the best of plot to plate.
03:02And he really knows his onions.
03:05I've got about six different varieties in here,
03:07all grown from seed.
03:09This is a showpiece. Look at the size of that one.
03:25You coming? Good lad.
03:34Right, let's have some fun.
03:35So this is going to be a shady container
03:38that's called getting to know you.
03:40I'm going to use plants that I don't know that well.
03:43And instead of just popping them where the label says in the garden,
03:46I don't forget where I've put them in the garden,
03:49which means they get extra TLC
03:51because I've put them in a container
03:53that I either go and sit by every single day,
03:56or maybe I walk by,
03:58or they're close to the greenhouse where I can water.
04:02So I've drilled holes in the bottom.
04:04So the next thing is to use the croc,
04:07which is broken old terracotta.
04:09The most important thing with this container
04:12is it drains well through the winter months.
04:14So next up is the gravel.
04:16If I can lift this up.
04:18And if I put a layer now,
04:21right across the bottom.
04:24So next, we'll start building our compost.
04:27So what I've done here is I've done a mix of
04:30paint-free compost,
04:32a little bit of topsoiling,
04:34some horticultural grit,
04:36and some composted bark.
04:39These are all sort of woodland,
04:41shade-loving plants.
04:43Now I'm going to add a magic ingredient.
04:46Think about a woodland.
04:48What happens in a woodland?
04:50Leaves fall every single year.
04:52They create leaf mould.
04:54So now if you think about it,
04:55what I've done is I've created my wooden floor.
04:58And now with the plants,
05:00the first one we're going to go for is this Mahonia.
05:03And this is called Volcano.
05:07The flowers come about October time.
05:09They start red.
05:10And then more or less explode
05:12to this sort of golden yellow.
05:15But like a lot of the sort of newer Mahonias
05:18that have come to the market,
05:20they've not got those really spiny leaves
05:23that you could not run your hands through.
05:26So what I'm going to do
05:28is I'm just going to take that out of the pot.
05:30Root system's good.
05:32And we're just going to work that at the back there.
05:35So that though in time,
05:38you know,
05:39will need to come out of this container
05:41because in the garden,
05:42once they get to know it,
05:43that's where it will be.
05:45It will get to one, 1.5 metres,
05:48but there next 12 months or so
05:52will be absolutely fine.
05:54So what I'm going to do now is counterbalance.
05:56So I'm going to use this sort of Japanese holly fern.
06:00Not a plant that I know.
06:02A mate says,
06:03Frosty, you need to try this.
06:05And first of all, I said,
06:06is it hardy?
06:07And he went, yeah, yeah, totally hardy.
06:09So next,
06:10I think we're going to go for a Pacissandra.
06:13But not as you know it.
06:15I think so many of us know Pacissandra
06:17as something that's grown, you know,
06:19in supermarket car parks,
06:21in shady spaces.
06:23Well, this is called Krug's cover.
06:25It flowers in the winter,
06:27white and scented.
06:29And that is followed by a little berry.
06:32All right.
06:33Now I'm going to try and come back in this size.
06:36So what I'm going to go for next
06:37is this Proopsis.
06:39And this is undulata.
06:41I know at the moment you need to look carefully,
06:44but look, that speckled stem,
06:46that, if you imagine,
06:48would be scrambling on a woodland floor in China.
06:53All right.
06:55So this is called Neolubartum.
06:57It's a fern that ultimately
06:59will get to probably about 40, 50 centimetres.
07:02So the next one is Rainachia.
07:05I suppose a little like Lily of the Valley.
07:09The scent is really strong.
07:14This idea of, you know,
07:16creating containers like this
07:19that are not driven, you know,
07:21by loads and loads of flower cover,
07:23are a great way to understand planting design.
07:27So all I'm doing now
07:29is just filling the voids in between the plants
07:32with that first compost mix that I made.
07:38So all I need to do now
07:39is give that a good soak in, let it settle.
07:42But why I'm doing that,
07:44Francis went to West Yorkshire
07:46to visit a very special garden.
07:57I'm so lucky to get to visit some really wonderful gardens,
08:05but this one has to be up there.
08:07It's got swathes of grasses and perennials
08:10that snake their way around the space.
08:13It's really, really balanced
08:15and the overall feel is incredibly naturalistic.
08:18But to create this has clearly taken an expert eye.
08:27But what makes this truly remarkable
08:30is that it's a private garden.
08:32It's the work of just one man.
08:35And this is just the front garden.
08:49The back garden is equally extraordinary
08:52with more gorgeous planting
08:54merging with the hills and trees beyond.
08:56The thread connecting it all
08:59is a devotion to a particular style,
09:02one which has captured our imagination
09:04and become hugely influential.
09:07Prairie planting.
09:11When prairie planting first emerged
09:13as a way of gardening,
09:14it was really groundbreaking
09:15and it was unlike anything that had come before.
09:17Generally, it's a planting scheme
09:19based around ornamental grasses,
09:22as you would see in a prairie,
09:24usually in North America.
09:26But the way of designing the beds
09:28is completely different.
09:29Rather than a cottage garden,
09:31it's enormous blocks of planting,
09:34things like this Persicaria,
09:36there's Eupatorium,
09:37there's a huge block of phlox here.
09:40And these huge groupings would never be seen
09:42in a cottage garden.
09:43in a cottage garden.
09:44But the idea is that on a big landscape scale,
09:46seeing huge groups of plants like this,
09:49especially with grasses running through them,
09:51can look really naturalistic.
09:52And generally speaking,
09:54prairie schemes are cut back once a year,
09:56usually in the spring.
09:57And that means you also have winter structure,
10:00so seed heads and berries,
10:02and of course,
10:03this massive, beautiful border
10:05in the height of the season.
10:16The man behind these wonderful drifts of perennials
10:18is retired GP Stephen Medley.
10:21So Stephen, this is obviously a commitment to this style,
10:28but tell me what inspired your interest
10:31in prairie style, naturalistic style planting.
10:34I began to see articles in magazines
10:37and on the television about Pete Adolf.
10:40Mm-hm.
10:41And then went to have a look at his garden in Scamston,
10:45which at that time was quite new for England.
10:49Yeah.
10:51How could I copy that
10:52and bring that look into my garden?
10:55How could I move from a Leap 2 garden
10:57to a Premiership garden?
10:59And how did you?
11:01A lot of hard work.
11:03So I first of all started removing the shrubs
11:06that were in this border
11:08and replacing them with herbaceous perennials
11:12all in block forms
11:14and then contrasting the flower heads
11:17from one species to the next.
11:19So we've got spires there,
11:21we've got bobbles here,
11:23an umbel in the phlox.
11:25Yeah.
11:28Umbels up there with the agapanthus.
11:30Yeah.
11:31More bobbles with the verbena brunariensis.
11:33Yeah.
11:34And of course the essential grasses.
11:35Yes.
11:36Yes.
11:37So this is the beginning?
11:38This is the beginning.
11:39This is the first bed.
11:40This is how it started.
11:46After perfecting his prairie-style border,
11:48Stephen's next project was to create a prairie-style meadow,
11:52employing a very specific technique known as matrix planting.
11:57In this kind of scheme, a single or a handful of species dominate,
12:04forming a matrix into which other plants are blended.
12:10In this design,
12:11Sprobulus heterolipus constituted initially 65% of the matrix.
12:16Right.
12:17Echinacea pallida hula dancer, 25% of the matrix.
12:21And Eryngium alpinum formed 10% of the matrix.
12:25Then through the matrix,
12:27you grow individual plants,
12:29such as this veronicastroamerica.
12:31Yes.
12:32Yes.
12:33Or the Eryngium yucifolium.
12:34Or blocks of plants,
12:35such as the hyalatelephium.
12:37Can you say that it sounds like a formula,
12:39and yet when you see it,
12:40it's just breathtakingly beautiful, isn't it?
12:44It's so lovely.
12:45And presumably that matrix has changed over time,
12:49but when was this planted?
12:50This was planted in 2015.
12:53This was my first post-retirement project.
12:56Right.
12:57I did half a day at work.
12:58Right.
12:59Half a day at Craven College in Eskipton,
13:02on the horticulture course,
13:04and then the day after started lifting the grass
13:07from this area to start the meadow.
13:10So first day of retirement?
13:12First day of retirement.
13:15Stephen put his well-earned free time to use
13:18by growing the huge amount of plants he'd need
13:21from seed or cuttings.
13:25You're pretty good at propagating then.
13:28I had to be.
13:29Yeah.
13:30Because, I mean, it would cost a small fortune
13:31to fill these beds with plants.
13:33How many plants are in them?
13:35There are around about 380 Sporobolis,
13:39about 180 Echinacea pallidas.
13:41OK.
13:42Plus all the rest.
13:43Right.
13:44So there were plants everywhere.
13:45Do you have a method when it comes to how you place things out?
13:48Like, which ones you plant first?
13:50Is it Sporobolis that goes in first?
13:52No.
13:53I planted the structure plants first.
13:55OK.
13:56So that's things like the oryngiums.
13:57The taller oryngiums.
13:58The veronicastrums.
13:59Right.
14:00And the blocks.
14:01The echinops blocks.
14:02OK.
14:03The limoniums.
14:06And then filled in with the matrix.
14:09OK.
14:10In the spaces.
14:11OK.
14:12And the average planting density through the whole planting
14:15must be round about 7 per square metre.
14:19Stephen has been pretty meticulous in creating his meadow.
14:23But in some parts of the garden,
14:25he's wandered off script, showing a lightness of touch all his own.
14:31This area here is one of my favourite parts of the garden.
14:34The colour scheme is just beautiful.
14:36It's so soft with kind of ochres of the nacella tenuissima,
14:40which most people would know as steeper tenuissima.
14:43And also, all the different soft blues.
14:46There's deep blue of veronica.
14:47There's perovskia.
14:48And then there's soft yellow scabius through it as well.
14:52Now, originally this was planted as block planting.
14:55But over time, different species have self-seeded and moved around.
14:59And it goes to show you that the gardener has a big impact
15:02on how this will eventually be.
15:04You could really carefully edit and keep it in the blocks
15:07that you originally had.
15:08Or you could, like Stephen has done,
15:10allow it to be dynamic and change and shift over the years.
15:15But always with this very tempered, very controlled colour palette
15:19that elevates it and stops it from being a meadow
15:22and keeps it a beautiful border.
15:25I think it's clear that Stephen is not the kind of man to blow his own trumpet,
15:42but I can do it for him.
15:44Because to have envisaged this, designed it, cleared it, planted it
15:50and then maintained it all by himself on this scale
15:54is such an achievement.
15:56And he should be exceedingly proud of this garden
16:00because it is absolutely glorious.
16:03What a garden.
16:15What did you think, boy?
16:17To be fair, I'd rather have a drink out of your watering can, Dad.
16:33Let's crack on.
16:35Meet Dahlia Murcii, which is my favourite Dahlia.
16:52Simple, mowed flower, not a lot bigger than that.
16:57Native of Mexico, gets to, what am I?
17:01I'm over six foot, so you're talking about 1.6, 1.7 metres.
17:06For me, to date, has been totally and utterly hardy.
17:13But that said, if we have a really cold, wet winter, I could lose this.
17:21So what I do this time of year is collect some seed.
17:25When do you do it?
17:26Well, if you start to look here,
17:28I've got flowers that are doing their business.
17:30I've still got some flowers to come.
17:32And I've got ones that have gone over.
17:34So the first thing to do for me
17:37is just to pick one that you think might have seeds in it.
17:41And just turn it out in your hand.
17:43And you'll soon see.
17:45There we go.
17:46There's loads of seeds in there.
17:48Then what you need to do
17:51is every time you go shopping from now on,
17:54do not ever throw a paper bag away.
17:57And then I'm just going to work across.
17:59Taking some of these off.
18:01And at the moment, all I'm going to do
18:04is drop these in here.
18:06You know, this is a plant that will come true from seed,
18:10which is brilliant.
18:11What I'll do when I've done these
18:13is I will put them in my office
18:16because the seeds are not going to get damp at all.
18:19So there we go.
18:21I reckon that will do me there.
18:24So what I could do now with this,
18:26now I've collected some seeds,
18:27I could now go over
18:29and I could literally tidy the rest of the bits and pieces off,
18:32making sure the flowers have gone over.
18:34This will now carry on flowering probably right into October,
18:38could even be November.
18:41But we're not stopping there.
18:43We're going to make the most of this beautiful sunshine.
18:46There's more to collect.
18:56Hey, I'm laughing because I've got to show you this.
18:59All the years that I've gardened
19:01and there's still certain things that blow my mind.
19:05This is a peony called Molly the Witch.
19:08Slow grower, but look at that foliage, is incredible.
19:12Then on top of that, April, May.
19:14Hello, young man.
19:15You all right?
19:17Flowers, April, May.
19:19Like that soft yellow.
19:21And I would love to grow it from seed.
19:23And you think, wow, look at that.
19:25Pink seed popping.
19:26That's got to be ready.
19:28But actually, with this particular plant,
19:31that pink seed indicates that it's infertile.
19:34If you wanted to sow the seed,
19:38it would need to be a dark blue black colour.
19:42And even then, it would take you probably
19:45about two years to germinate.
19:49It's amazing, isn't it?
19:50The growing world.
19:52Let's find something that we can propagate.
20:00I know it doesn't look a lot,
20:03but this is a plant that I fell in love with
20:06probably about four or five years ago.
20:09It's called Delphinium recuenei.
20:12I mean, it's got a sort of soft blue flower
20:15that's about June time.
20:18It's an incredible plant.
20:21And you'll read.
20:22Some places it will tell you that it's a short-lived perennial.
20:25Other places it will tell you that actually it's a biannual,
20:28so it completes its growing cycle in two years.
20:32But for me, strangely, a lot of the time now,
20:35it's behaving like an annual.
20:37So it's hitting the ground.
20:39It's germinating, coming up and doing this all in 12 months.
20:44I'm going to tip the seeds and you'll see if this works.
20:51There you go.
20:53You can see how many seeds just literally pop out.
20:59The two plants that I've collected from are species plants,
21:03which means, you know, they grow in the wild.
21:06That means the seed that I collect from them will come true to the parent.
21:12Whereas if you start collecting from plants that have been bred,
21:15so we call the hybrids,
21:17then you're not guaranteed that they're going to be true to the parent.
21:21Sometimes this growing world, as fascinating as it is,
21:26can be a little bit complicated.
21:28Now, we are off to meet a man who, 14 plus years ago,
21:38decided to totally and utterly change his life.
21:43I got into gardening as a child and now, later in life,
21:50I very much enjoy the physical side
21:53and I enjoy the feeling at the end of the day
21:55when you really feel you've achieved something
21:57and, frankly, you are exhausted.
21:59But it's very rewarding.
22:01The planting in the garden is quite big and blousy and bold.
22:07I'm not sure that reflects me as a person, to be honest,
22:12because I think I'm quite conservative with a small c.
22:15By nature, I'm actually fairly introverted
22:19and so the garden gives me a way to be a little bit extrovert.
22:25I'm Rudruth Jindal.
22:27I used to be a lawyer and this is my garden in Suffolk
22:31and it's something which I've created myself over the last 14 years.
22:35I trained as a lawyer and I spent 20-odd years in London and in Hong Kong.
22:42But, ultimately, it just wasn't my personality
22:47and I gave up my career in my mid-40s.
22:51I was a litigation lawyer, which involves arguing
22:55and I don't really like arguing.
22:57The nice thing about gardening is I'm out here usually by myself
23:01and there's no one to argue with.
23:04The plants just do their own thing and I do my own thing
23:07and I absolutely love it.
23:10It's been quite a journey from giving up my career
23:13and then moving here full-time in 2019
23:16and getting married and having a very different life.
23:19The sensible thing to do with a garden when you first start out
23:23is to leave it a year and see how the wind blows
23:26and the land drains and the sun shines.
23:29But I was impatient. I wanted to get on with it.
23:32I had the idea of creating a garden in the field
23:35which wraps round the cottage.
23:37So I started off with the wildflower meadow
23:40and the formal garden
23:42but I've expanded beyond that to create a prairie garden.
23:45Because it's quite a large plot, it's about three acres,
23:50the sight lines are quite important
23:52because you want to be able to lead people around the garden.
23:58Without a doubt, this is one of our favourite areas.
24:01This meadow has been going for about 14 years.
24:06To come through the gate and to walk into this
24:09and to see every day what might be in the meadow
24:12is really rewarding and fun.
24:15So what I did was mow it as low as I could
24:18and then scarify or rake it
24:20to create space for the wildflower seeds.
24:22So here we're on pretty solid clay
24:25and so I got a mix which was suitable for clay soils.
24:29So this is yellow rattle.
24:31Here you can see it in flower.
24:33This is a very clever plant because it strangles grasses
24:36and it creates space thereby for wildflower seeds to grow.
24:40We have quite a decent variety of wildflowers in here,
24:44obviously the oxeye daisies.
24:47We also get the orchids
24:49and the one down here is a lovely pyramid orchid.
24:53It's never ending and it's changing all the time as well
24:56and we hope we'll get more interest and variety as the years go on.
25:02But I thought it would be really nice to be able to walk through the meadow
25:05so we have this curving path and that makes a real difference
25:08because you can get really in amongst the flowers, which is lovely.
25:11But it's also the sense that when you mow a path
25:15it lifts everything else around it and it creates definition
25:19and everything else stands out just a little bit more.
25:26I'm really a self-taught gardener.
25:29I did a few day courses
25:31but basically I went to a lot of gardens
25:33and I was always at the front of the queue on the tour
25:35with my notebook in hand.
25:37So my knowledge built up in that way.
25:40At Dixter they have, you know, topiary in the middle of a meadow
25:44and that inspired me to think about doing something similar here.
25:50So these are my hornbeam cubes.
25:52We have three of them in a row
25:54and they add an important aspect of formality to the garden.
25:57So I love the contrast of them.
25:59This one here is probably about seven feet high.
26:02They were staked for the first two or three years
26:05and then when they've reached the height you want
26:07you cut the tops off
26:08and then that causes the rest of it to get bushy.
26:13I'm really happy with the way these have turned out.
26:14They're very tight, they're very square
26:16and in my dreams I'm thinking,
26:18well maybe I could cut them at an angle
26:20and make them look like tumbling dice.
26:22My parents came to England in the mid-fifties
26:31and we ended up in Huddersfield
26:33and my father fell ill with cancer
26:35and passed away within six months.
26:38My mother's garden was a sanctuary for her
26:40from a busy life as a doctor,
26:43challenging times in the sixties and seventies.
26:46I just sort of fell into the garden.
26:49She never asked me to do anything.
26:51I just did it because it was there and I enjoyed it.
26:54Mowing the lawn and being creative with my stripes.
26:57There is a picture of me aged maybe,
26:59I don't know, four or five years old
27:01and I'm standing behind a lawn mower.
27:03My mother always wore a sari to work
27:05and when we could afford it
27:07my mother took my brother and I to India
27:09and on those trips we often went to sari shops
27:14and I would help my mum.
27:16She would ask my opinion about the sari she was about to buy
27:20and I think that experience has stuck with me in a way
27:25in that I do have an interest in texture and form and colour.
27:32So in the meadow we've created several kind of stand-alone island beds.
27:39Initially I wasn't sure what to put into it but I love irises.
27:44Irises after they flower need sun
27:46and you need to get sun onto the rhizomes.
27:50And so I had that in mind
27:52and therefore I wanted to put in plants that were light and airy
27:55whilst at the same time creating later season interest.
28:00So this is Achillea gold plate
28:02and then in the winter you get these lovely brown seed heads
28:05which are so attractive.
28:07Down here we have Gowra whirling butterflies.
28:11Again it moves in the wind.
28:13It doesn't shade the irises too much.
28:18So this is the long border which sits in front of the cottage.
28:22Initially it was only about six feet deep
28:26and that was a mistake
28:27because it just looked like it was pushed against the hedge
28:29and you couldn't really appreciate it.
28:31So over the years I've brought it forward and then forward again and then forward again.
28:35So now it's about 12 or 15 feet deep.
28:38I think height is really important in a border especially when it's this wide.
28:42And for me one of the nicest plants is this Flomis.
28:46We're all probably aware of the yellow Flomis
28:48but this is a sort of a mauve one which is very pretty.
28:51And this wonderful Lichnus chalcedonica also provides height and colour.
28:58So it's very stimulating.
29:00It's self seeds and if you look over to this side you'll see a whole host of them together.
29:05So the height is really important because it lifts the border
29:08and it causes you to look up as you walk through it.
29:20Having been a lawyer for 20 odd years
29:22and really doing something which I didn't enjoy and frankly did my head in
29:27it was important for me to find something that defined me
29:30that perhaps I could be good at.
29:32And I really wanted to create something beautiful.
29:39Although people say once a lawyer always a lawyer
29:42I kind of hope now maybe I can say I'm a gardener.
29:47I think so.
30:02If you've created a garden that beautiful you can definitely call yourself a gardener.
30:14And so many of us think we need that sort of space to make a difference.
30:19And we don't.
30:20I moved in here and I wanted to create a garden that carried more diversity.
30:25So it needed to have a mini meadow.
30:28So this was an old scrubby path.
30:30I had the pear trees and then an area that was about 7 metres by about 1.8.
30:36And I thought that's it.
30:38We've got the red campion.
30:39We've got the yarrow now.
30:40You know things like scabias, knapweed.
30:43For me the bit that's blown my mind is the wildlife that came in and used this meadow
30:50and how beneficial it's been to my veg garden and the rest of the garden.
30:54You can now see most of the flowers have gone over.
30:58It's looking slightly tatty.
31:00But there's loads of seed heads in here.
31:02So this is a time of year now to get in and cut it back to the ground.
31:07As you can see this is a slightly awkward space.
31:11If I get the strimmer in here it's going to go all over the place.
31:15There's no chance I'm getting a mower on here.
31:18So my chosen tool is, as strange as it might seem, the hedge trimmer.
31:23I'm going to use this and we're going to work our way through.
31:40Obviously, you know, we think wildflower, everything's a wildflower and technically you're right.
31:46But what I don't want in here is any real pernicious weed that's going to sort of take it over.
31:52And I've got bindweed in my hedge and I've just spotted it in here.
31:58So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to mark it.
32:01You know, during the next sort of few days I can dig that out, you know, and get rid of it.
32:05I'm never going to get rid of it totally, but at least then I can just keep on top of it.
32:11Right.
32:12Who doubted me? I told you it would work.
32:28I might get in there with a fork and thrash it around a little bit.
32:33And what I'm trying to do is get the seed to fall to the ground.
32:36That then will germinate for next year.
32:39But then I will tidy away because ultimately if it breaks down, it will start to feed the soil.
32:43And that's one thing that you definitely don't want.
32:47While I get on with cutting the other half, we are now off with Averley, who's gone to visit a garden that has been created by a fascinating couple.
32:58When it comes to gardeners, there are some names that are synonymous with a particular place.
33:17And for many, the name Vita Sackville West means only one thing, Sissinghurst.
33:24The Elizabethan castle in Kent that her and her husband, Harold, revived and turned into one of Britain's most iconic gardens.
33:35However, it was not their first, not even their second garden, but their third.
33:41Before Vita and Harold created Sissinghurst, their early horticultural knowledge came from here, just 20 miles away, at a garden called Long Barn.
33:54Vita was born in 1892, the only child to aristocratic parents.
34:02She began writing at an early age, finishing eight novels before she was 18.
34:08She would go on to become a world-renowned poet and writer, as well as a garden designer.
34:15In 1913, she married Harold Nicholson, a diplomat, much to the disappointment of her parents, who had hoped that she would marry one of her other wealthier suitors.
34:31When they moved here, Vita and Harold were complete novices, but as they built up the garden together, it brought out their different strengths.
34:48Harold was in charge of the structure, strong lines of paths, hedges and walls, while Vita filled every space with the rich and overflowing planting that she loved.
35:03Vita's motto was cram, cram, cram, cram, cram, cram, and even today, the garden is filled to overflowing.
35:18You can see Harold's outline in the strong east-west paths that line the garden, and then, running at right angles, is this.
35:31A stunning arch recently replanted with scented roses and other climbers.
35:38But you can see that the path to the bench is not dead straight, which just shows how organically this garden developed by a couple who were still very new to gardening.
35:54Vita and Harold planned this garden to thrive long after them.
36:01On the yew columns that run the length of the garden, Vita wrote to Harold and said,
36:07they will look silly at first, but when we're a handful of ashes, they will draw sharabangs, or buses, full of tourists from London, which they regularly do.
36:22Yews like these were crucial to Vita and Harold's big idea at Long Barn, garden rooms.
36:32They divided up the area into separate spaces, each with a theme designed to evoke its own atmosphere.
36:44The Dutch garden's L-shaped beds were filled with a mass of cottage garden planting, which felt exuberant and very modern.
36:53But next door were two peaceful knot gardens, which wouldn't have looked out of place in the 16th century.
37:00Further away from the formality and colour of the main garden, the orchard has a completely different feel, and much closer to the practical gardens that would have surrounded the house for hundreds of years before.
37:16And although Vita was the plants woman, Harold also had strong opinions on what plants would and wouldn't work at Long Barn.
37:29This is a collection of letters, and in one he writes,
37:35I agree that if rhododendrons were native to Kent, they would be exactly and absolutely what we want.
37:45But they are not natives, and we should spoil our lovely Kentish atmosphere.
37:51And I agree with Harold. It certainly has the feel of a Kentish farm.
38:03And through these various garden rooms, Harold and Vita hosted fabulous parties filled with the great and the good.
38:16And amongst the artists, authors and actors were some of the many lovers that Vita and Harold took.
38:25Harold and Vita had an open marriage, which was highly unconventional for the 1920s.
38:35They loved, trusted and respected each other, but both had the freedom to indulge their own passions of the heart.
38:44The longest and most intense of all was Vita's love affair with the renowned writer, Virginia Woolf.
38:51Vita and Virginia's affair continued for several years, all the while Vita was carrying on with a married woman named Mary Campbell.
39:03Honestly, it's like a soap opera. If only these youth could talk.
39:08As their son later put it, their marriage was a safe harbour and the affairs were mere ports of call.
39:23And walking through this garden, you can sense the balance of Vita and Harold's personalities.
39:30Despite all the drama, Harold and Vita lived a happy life, leaving Long Barn for Sissinghurst in 1932 and remained married until their deaths.
39:45And the joy of sitting in a poet's garden is that sometimes you can see it through their eyes.
39:56In 1915, not long after they'd moved here, Vita wrote a very simple poem called The Garden.
40:04We had a garden on a hill. We planted rose and daffodil, flowers that English poets sing and hoped for glory in the spring.
40:15We waited for them all to grow. We planted wallflowers in a row and lavender and borage blue, but love was all that ever grew.
40:26In the end, that's what this garden is, not just a backdrop for tempestuous affairs.
40:37It is a garden built of love, as all the best gardens are.
40:42I have no idea that even then, as a couple, you know, they were creating it for the next generation to enjoy.
41:11And also, wouldn't you have loved an invite to one of their parties? I know I would.
41:18So, that's it. Job done. Discovered some step over apples that I'd forgotten about.
41:24But the next point of interest here will really be the spring bulbs.
41:29As I wander up the steps to the gravel garden, things sort of died away over the season.
41:51And I just want to fill the space. So, I just thought here it would be lovely just to add another layer just going into the back end of the summer, early autumn.
42:00I'm creating a rhythm through the garden that's driven by grasses.
42:03So, we've got a millennia here. We've got a millennia up there, which are quite low growth, big spiky flowers.
42:09So, what I've done in here is gone for a Callum agrostis. And this is called Brachytrica.
42:18But the interesting thing with this is it will get to about 1.2 metres and then start to flower.
42:25But the flower has got a beautiful sort of purpley tinge to it.
42:30So, it's going to sort of sit here, connect the verticals of the grasses, but then it's going to start to play with these plants.
42:39And then, anemone, good, reliable autumn colour.
42:44This is a new one to me called Serenade.
42:48This will get up to about sort of 600ml growth and the flower will sit about 200ml above that.
42:55And you've got a lovely pink flower, but also at the same time, beautiful, strong, rich foliage.
43:03So, that will go in there.
43:05And the star of this particular show is going to be this oak-leafed hydrangea.
43:12As we go into the autumn, the leaves on this are rich, glorious, deep, that sort of warmth that the autumn colours bring.
43:22But when it loses its leaves, as it matures, the stems become quite interesting because they slightly peel and they're slightly more coppery.
43:30So, that's how this whole thing really glues together.
43:34Then, when it comes to the planting, I've made sure everything's weed-free this time of year.
43:42If you're thinking about doing any planting, obviously that moisture content is going to be really important.
43:48So, what I've gone for is some composted bark.
43:53What I might do afterwards as well, when I've finished and I've given everything a really good soaking,
44:00is that I might use some of this bark in around the plants just to lock that moisture in.
44:09What's lovely about this particular oak-leafed hydrangea is it will take more sun than lots of the others.
44:18But this will also deal with semi-shade.
44:21What I don't want to do is plant this too deep.
44:25If you imagine, you can see that growth habit there now, what's going to happen is slowly over time,
44:30it's going to mound a little bit on the steps, up on there, and it gives this lovely sort of link.
44:36And if we put the anemone in there, and I know the Japanese anemones don't always come with the best reputation.
44:47And you know, some people can be a little snobby about them and say, yeah, but they're thuggish.
44:53But actually, in reality, look at the growth, that lake colour that it's going to bring you.
45:00And with that, the reliability.
45:03So next, we're going to get in this Cali Magrostis.
45:10Grasses are not everybody's cup of tea, alright?
45:13So my sales pitch to you, if you were not into them,
45:18was just to say that not every plant you add to your garden needs to be a star, alright?
45:26They play beautifully with the light, they'll give you some movement, a moment of calm, and even sound, you know, on a windy day.
45:35But what is lovely, is once I water those, you know, mulching around the next few weeks,
45:42because there's warmth in that soil, those roots will really start to get away.
45:47and going into the autumn, coming up those stairs,
45:52will just give me a moment before I find my little seat over in the corner there.
45:59Now, we're off to meet a chef who's had his head turned by the wonder of Grow Your Own.
46:06I'm a real fan of preserving the season as much as possible.
46:18As we all know as gardeners, we always end up with a glut of something.
46:22That's the time to preserve it.
46:23So you've still got the great flavour of that produce, no matter what time of year.
46:30My name's Darrell Taylor.
46:31I head up the produce garden here at Thyme, a country estate in the Cotswolds with a hotel and restaurant.
46:43So now I'm a gardener, but actually I am a trained chef.
46:46So my background is cooking, but I've always had a passion for growing.
46:52As a chef, I know how I want things to taste in my kitchen.
46:57So when I grow here, I kind of almost know the end result.
47:03I know what I'm looking for.
47:04I know the size that I would like to have that in my kitchen.
47:12I've just always had this kind of inner love for propagation and growing things from seed.
47:17It's so rewarding.
47:18So when I was offered a full-time position as the gardener here,
47:21I just had to think about it a little bit because the garden here is pretty big.
47:26I took a little step back and thought, well, how can I really kind of make this garden work?
47:30And I love it because it's a new challenge.
47:33So I'm on a great now kind of learning curve about different varieties.
47:38And yeah, so I'm kind of, I'm beginning my career, my second career, which is really exciting.
47:42And now I'm a, yeah, chef turned gardener.
47:50I love growing onions.
47:51I've got about six different varieties in here, all grown from seed, ready to be brought inside now and just finished drying off.
47:58But this is a showpiece. Look at the size of that one.
48:01Beetroot.
48:02Beetroot. This is called Chioggia. It's a stripy beetroot from the Chioggia region in northern Italy.
48:09Golden beetroot here. They're heading up quite nicely. They'll be ready soon.
48:13Really nice thing beetroot, just kind of whole when they're quite small.
48:16You can just roast them. You could accompany that to some roast meat, a pork chop.
48:21You could have it with some tahini drizzled on. Beetroots are really versatile, a really nice vegetable.
48:25I like them a lot.
48:27And then these lovely guys, trombetta, courgette.
48:29You can roast them and they'll hold their shape. They don't have a huge water content.
48:33So quite a nice thing to kind of showcase. But I think they're wonderful.
48:43What was a great thing for me in my career as a chef, it was always about the produce.
48:50So in this polytunnel, I'm experimenting this year with gherkins.
48:54Never grown them before.
48:55I've planted quite a few plants because, you know, gherkins are quite small.
48:59So if we're going to pickle them or make a crop worthwhile, I need a decent quantity.
49:04So these are grown in the same way that you would grow cucumbers.
49:08I've got them growing up these wires.
49:11Every morning I just come in and then just twist them round and they've got these tendrils which will just wire themselves on.
49:16So we would brine them to start within some salt and then pack them into a solution, maybe with some fennel seeds or horseradish leaves.
49:24I'm always thinking about what I'm going to grow, what I'm growing next year.
49:33I've already started the list on my phone that's been going forever.
49:35So I'm always thinking about that time ahead of what we can look to grow and go on that growing journey, I suppose.
49:42We often find we grow all of our vegetables summertime and don't necessarily think about kind of those winter harvests.
49:53But radicchioes and chicorias are a really underrated vegetable, pretty straightforward to grow and delicious to cook.
50:01Radicchioes and chicorias being a leafy crop, they are a nice thing to follow on from a legume.
50:07So a broad bean, a pea, an early crop of runner beans, because the legumes fix nitrogen into the soil.
50:14And it's really good to follow on something that's going to really like that part of the garden, that nitrogen fix.
50:19Radicchio is even really nice in a pasta. Sometimes I've sliced and fried radicchio with cream and rosemary, maybe some chilli flakes and some capers.
50:29And you could mix that through some panne pasta or some spaghetti.
50:36This is a real journey of learning and I feel, you know, I've got the base foundations as a gardener, but now I'm a grower.
50:45It's nourishing to having your hands in the soil. It's really hard work.
50:50And I take the approach as I do when I'm in the kitchen. I want to be productive. Yeah, it's really rewarding.
50:57This is my Fatouche salad, a traditional Lebanese salad showcasing the beautiful ingredients we've got in the garden at the moment.
51:04I take three varieties of tomato, atomic fusion, green zebra and one of my favourites, black cherry.
51:16Toss those with cucumbers, one green, one crystal lemon, celery and feta cheese.
51:23Add soft herbs and a good squeeze of lemon. Throw in a huge pinch of sumac and finally a good plug of olive oil.
51:35Toasted pita bread, salt and pepper, mix it all up.
51:40And there's my Fatouche salad.
51:45I thought that salad was absolutely incredible. In fact, watching Darrell make it just made me peckish.
52:03And also the idea of using horseradish leaves to flavour the gherkins when you're pickling them.
52:11I am definitely going to use that. So thank you.
52:14I said about my holiday, didn't I? This was the biggest surprise. The veg garden and anybody that grows courgettes will know you end up with courgettes, courgettes, courgettes.
52:31Or a marrow. So that will definitely be a meal later on in the week. I want to pick all these little babies.
52:56So this time of year, it's all about picking, picking and picking. And on that note, let's see what else we can find.
53:11It is like a journey of discovery. This is a great little herb called silver sorrel. If I chop this finely, it gives a lovely sort of citrusy flavour.
53:31I'm salad. Right, come on.
53:44You're going to love this. Nasturtiums are doing really well.
53:49That peppery flower is incredible. Dwarf French beans, nice and easy. These beans are like incredible. Just so many of them.
54:05Good day. Absolutely wonderful.
54:08Wonderful. So I think now, just some young leaves to add to a salad. Maybe some cut flower.
54:16I love the taste of chard.
54:31And then maybe just a few Estrantia stems.
54:35Actually, I nearly forgot something. Come with me.
54:50Anybody that grows veg and fruit will understand this. Each year, I think you have a moment of glory.
54:58Well, this is it. These peaches, the crop is unbelievable.
55:03Wow.
55:12I'm telling you, life does not get much better than that.
55:17So, while I pick the rest of these, here's a few things you could be doing at the weekend.
55:23Obviously, you fancy it.
55:24Hosters can look a little untidy after they've finished flowering, so it's worth removing the spent blooms once they've gone over.
55:42Cut each stem back to the base, taking care not to cut any leaves by mistake.
55:49Your plants will look a lot better as a result and won't waste any energy making seeds.
55:56Composting is a great way of making use of your garden waste, as long as you have a good balance between green and brown.
56:09Soft material can be added as it is, but anything woody is best chopped up.
56:16When it starts to rot down, turn it every now and then, using a fork.
56:20This helps to mix up the ingredients and add air, speeding up the decomposition process.
56:31Coriander is easy to grow from seed and, with a bit of protection, may even survive the winter outdoors.
56:38Using a large pot or a spare patch of earth, make a series of shallow drills.
56:47Water allow to drain and then sow into the wet soil, leaving about five centimetres, which is two inches, between each seed.
56:57I like to sow mine now, as it tends to bolt over the summer.
57:02Keep well watered and, with luck, you'll have some leaves to pick come October.
57:08Come on, mate.
57:17We have a special guest.
57:21Look who's come to say hello.
57:23It's Isla.
57:25Interestingly, the amount of people since we've had busts to her saying,
57:29Is Isla okay?
57:31Yes, Isla is okay.
57:33She's quite happy and loves being out in the garden.
57:38Don't you, girl?
57:39Yeah.
57:41And it has been a great day.
57:42But, if you grow veg and fruit, for me that takes it all on to a different level.
57:47You know, I've got my chard, my beans, I'm thinking maybe pasta, cream.
57:52You know, the marrow, maybe that stuff later on in the week.
57:56And then rounding that all off with those beautiful peaches.
58:03That's got to be my proudest moment in the garden this year.
58:07Keep that simple.
58:08Ice cream.
58:09Job done.
58:11Anyway, I'm afraid that is it from us this week.
58:14Monty will be back next week at Longmeadow.
58:17In the meantime, enjoy your bank holiday weekend and look after yourselves.
58:22Bye bye.
58:23Bye bye.
58:24Bye bye.
58:25Bye bye.
58:26Bye bye.
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