The design of the gardens follows the design of the house, with the very best of traditional structures and ideas blending with the best of current planting and design ideas.
A new intimate garden is being created on the east side of the house. Enclosed by a chest height yew hedge, a new lawn will be flanked to the south by a generous rose-filled border to provide glorious scents and jewelled colours from early summer through autumn. On the north edge the autumn colours of mature shrubs in a long banked border extend the interest into winter. To the west of the house another newly planted long border has particular late winter interest with hellebores and bulbs following the snowdrops and crocus that flood the ground beneath specimen trees on the main lawn edge. The fully restored formal circular pond beyond is centrally planted with white flowers, and filled with water lilies.
Behind the house spring bulbs also flood the wild woodland garden, the pathways leading through ranks of daffodils, then bluebells and camassia, later roses and clematis spill down the walls and wild flowers take over underfoot. At the eastern end, rhododendrons take over, forming a dense screen to the lane and the river, specimen trees include a stunning magnolia, and a small fruit orchard leads to the river's edge.
Alongside the west of the house a charming sitting and dining garden has been created, a large table and barbecue sit on the generous stone flagged area, bordered by scented flowers and fresh herbs for the pot.
Beyond the stable block a major renovation project is underway. The gently sloping south facing walled garden had retreated into pony paddocks over the past century, leaving only a small kitchen garden immediately below the greenhouse and a decaying Victorian vine house. Here a new traditional vegetable garden is taking shape, with a geometric layout of paths and beds to provide fresh vegetables, soft fruit and cut flowers for the house for most of the year. The garden will be managed without chemical sprays or bought in fertilisers, and eventually surplus produce will be sold locally. It is hoped that the coming years will see the vine house restored, and boundary walls repaired to grow climbing fruit once more.
Guests will be able to stroll through the kitchen garden, and into the riverside field beyond, which will one day be a new wild garden, planted with spring flowering shrubs by the river's edge, and clumps of wild flowers on the banks that form a natural amphitheatre above the river.
