Hidcote

Hidcote garden is remarkable.....a garden to remember.  It has wonderful strong design and underneath all the planting it is very structured.  It is one of the most enjoyable gardens I have been to and sits right up in the top 3 highlights of this trip.

It was designed, planted and built by Mr Lawrence through the early part of the 20^th century so is quite a modern garden in some senses.  It is made into a series of rooms so you don’t see all the garden in one go and the areas vary in size and shape.  Plants are in masses of one variety often which works really well with the structure.  It’s a really large estate and there was lots of money available to help this enormous garden go together but it doesn’t have any ostentation about it at all.

It’s very well designed.  The proportions and scale of space used for areas of the garden are truly lovely.  Beautiful big and small hedges separate areas.  Some areas are intimate and thus planted this way while some areas are grand and have distinct presence.

Hidcote was the first actual garden rather than a house to be given to the National Trust in 1948, and they weren’t quite sure how to manage it....but it started the whole concept of having gardens looked after and preserved in their own right and for ‘National Significance’.  And now many people travel around Trust properties simply to view the gardens and they are promoted this way also.  Last year 150,000 people visited the garden at Hidcote up by 50,000 from the year before!!  It also has a great program for  apprentices learning their trade.

It would be a great place to come to learn to garden.  It has the most wonderful feeling about it and is a garden that would be enjoyable to just stay in.