Walled garden | Lincolnshire | current
Jonathan Hendry Architects designing the new residence
BRIEF
Imagine what a C21st walled garden be and look like.
Consider a walled garden which takes lessons from the past, but is also dynamic and relevant for the future.
Create a place ‘to engage with, not just observe’ (a memorable comment made by the client).
PLACE
The walled garden at Norton Place is around 2 acres in size and situated on a gentle southerly decline. Long abandoned, yet still bounded by magnificent walls built from Lincolnshire limestone and brick, it is discretely situated at the outer edge of an historic parkland. Arrived at almost unexpectedly, it is embraced on two sides by mature woodland with a mighty old Lime tree standing sentinel between the garden entrance and the far-off view of the main house.
CONCEPT
‘Becoming farmer and forager’.
The garden would be infused with the principles of permaculture and find a balance between controlled allotments and self-seeded, foraged fare. There are many different ways to be productive and many different types of harvest and crop.
Redefining the bones of the garden will weave house and garden together and make space for a wide variety of habitats thus creating a dynamic environment that will work with nature to be productive. This would include the replenishment of the soils and storage of on-site water and horticultural experimentation could be embraced within the context of the walled micro-climate.
Importantly, this will also be a home to grow up in, for the same family whose ancestors built the walled garden. Active participation and re-engagement in the garden is key to its renewed productivity and continual regeneration.
The fine balance between a productive garden and a pleasure garden
Our first passion at Meeuwsen Muldoon is for plants and gardens. The more you know the better you can design. One never stops learning about horticulture. We have been very lucky to visit and talk with the head gardeners of two of England’s most spectacular walled gardens. Felbrigg Hall in Norfolk, seen here in early September,with its famous sub-tropical central walk of heat loving plants and exotics. And West Dean in West Sussex, seen here in January. Its ground being prepared for the bumper crops they yield each year and the quantity of different produce made for them. Each is very special with its own mircro-climate.
