We Made a Garden

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This landmark work on creating a garden was first published in 1956 and has rarely been out of print since. We Made a Garden is the story of how Margery Fish, the leading British gardener of the mid-twentieth century, and her husband, Walter, transformed an acre of wilderness into a stunning cottage garden, still open to the public at East Lambrook Manor, Somerset, England. Quirky and readable, this book details her creation of a world-renowned cottage garden, as well as her battles with Walter in the process, who preferred the standard suburban approach. naturally-as the weather. Nor shall I forget Walter's indignation with the report when it did come in. The house, while sound in wind and limb, was described as being of "no character." We didn't think then that it had anything but character, rather sinister perhaps, but definitely character. Since then I have discovered that the house has a kindly disposition; I never come home without feeling I am welcome. However, according to David St John Thomas writing in 2004, "It was a miracle that [the garden] survived unscathed." Robert and Mary Anne Williams bought it after visiting the house in the dark and had no inkling of the garden's importance, with its two longstanding gardeners, or knowledge of Margaret Fish. However, Robert completed a Royal Horticultural College course, and they were soon employing 28 staff, with a tearoom, shop and art gallery. [14]

Yes, they were part of a campaign, and the purpose of the campaign was not to teach her to garden properly (which was not in his gift), but to prevent her from doing so and thereby leaving him behind I am sorry to hear that you are unhappy in Liverpool. I have been there for nearly a week and had I known you were there, I would have seen you. It is difficult to find appointments just now, but yours is an exceptional case. You crossed the Atlantic when the submarines were at their worst and I have always given special treatment to those of my staff who took the risk. I will do my utmost. Meanwhile please come and see me tomorrow, Tuesday morning at 11.30 at No 1 Carlton Gardens. With the exception of February the garden is closed on all Sundays and Mondays including Bank Holiday Mondays.) She was educated at the Friends School Saffron Walden and at a secretarial college, before spending twenty years working in Fleet Street, initially with countryside magazines and then with Associated Newspapers. There she accompanied Lord Northcliffe on a war mission to the United States in 1916, and then worked as secretary to six successive editors of the Daily Mail, the last of whom, the widower Walter Fish, she married on 2 March 1933, three years after his retirement. During and after her period with Associated Newspapers she wrote for several other papers and periodicals, including the field-sports magazine The Field. All the titles have been reprinted in various forms at various times. Several have been translated into German, Dutch, Italian and other languages.In the development of gardening in the second half of the twentieth century no garden has yet had greater effect.” John Sales, National Trust 1980. Oh give me such a 14ft pole with a forked end and let me loose on this interesting and pleasant work, so that I can catch and guide these freely waving shoots of the old climbing roses, and paint my picture with them "with upright spring! with downward swag!" in the heights of a yew tree, on one of those odds and ends of unclassified places about my home grounds. Margery Fish died in South Petherton Hospital, Somerset, on 24 March 1969, leaving her house and garden to a nephew, Henry Boyd-Carpenter. He and other relatives kept up the garden and extended the nursery. [1] They were sold in 1985, but the next owners, Andrew and Dodo Norton, maintained the garden and nursery and continued to develop the legacy of Margery Fish, before handing over to the Williams family in 1999. [13]

The late Margery Fish, well-known English garden writer, recounts the joys and trials of creating, with her husband, the now-famous cottage gardens at East Lambrook Manor in Somerset. First published in 1956 by W.H. & L. Collingridge, Ltd. This edition is edited and contains a foreword by Graham Stuart Thomas. Twenty-four lovely b&w photos. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com) This is a charming little book by Margery Fish, offering anecdotal history of the choosing and planting of a home garden in England. According the the introduction, Fish passed decades ago but her garden has recently been restored. He credits her with how we grow our gardens. I think he must be right. We didn't start work outside for nearly a year, and by that time we felt we belonged to the place and it belonged to us and we had some ideas of what we wanted to do with it.At the start of World War I, Lord Northcliffe was the most powerful man in Fleet Street, wielding influence at every level. So when in 1917 the prime minister, Lloyd George, asked him to head the British Mission to the USA, Northcliffe immediately requested that Margery be on his staff. It meant crossing the Atlantic under threat of enemy torpedoes, but she accepted without hesitation. The mission spent three years in the USA and Margery was awarded the MBE in recognition of her contribution. First published in 1956, We Made a Garden is the story of how Margery Fish, the leading gardener of the 1960s, and her husband Walter transformed an acre of wilderness into a stunning cottage garden, still open to the public at East Lambrook Manor, Somerset, England. This is now one of the most important books on gardening ever written. A beautiful and timeless book on creating a garden.

Margery Fish developed a style of gardening which was in tune with the times: the Second World War had made labour scarce and expensive and it was no longer a reality to have paid teams of gardeners. Gardens had to change. While the cottage garden style was already apparent at Hidcote and Sissinghurst, these were gardens that still required paid gardeners. What Mrs Fish created at East Lambrook Manor, was a grand cottage garden on a domestic scale, she wrote, “It is pleasant to know each one of your plants intimately because you have chosen and planted every one of them.” For the first time a garden had been created to which anyone could relate. It was an ‘approachable’ garden and through her many books and articles, Margery managed to change gardening from a pastime of the wealthy to a passion for the whole population. Margery Fish became an avid galanthophile or snowdrop enthusiast. Her book A Flower for Every Day includes an account of the giant snowdrop variety "S. Arnott", first exhibited at a Royal Horticultural Society exhibition in 1951 and acquired by her from a specialist company. There were said in 2008 still to be 60 different named varieties of Galanthus nivalis growing at East Lambrook. [9] Several snowdrop varieties discovered in the "ditch garden" at Lambrook since Margery Fish's death have been named and described. [10] Writing [ edit ] You can't make a garden in a hurry, particularly one belonging to an old house. House and garden must look as if they had grown up together and the only way to do this is to live in the house, get the feel of it, and then by degrees the idea of the garden will grow. You do not have to covet the tower room in Sissinghurst Castle, you do not have to be wearing jodhpurs, to feel the charm of this thought, that you might be quietly reading or in leisurely conversation, and there might be a vase of peonies nearby, and a flowerhead would fall, and you would notice it, because that's the kind of beauty-noticing person you would be . Larger than any rose, it has something of the cabbage rose's voluminous quality; and when it finally drops from the vase, it sheds its vast petticoats with a bump on the table, all in an intact heap, much as a rose will suddenly fall, making us look up from our book or conversation, to notice for one moment the death of what had still appeared to be a living beauty.The house was long and low, in the shape of an L, built of honey-coloured Somerset stone. At one time it must have been thatched but, unfortunately, that had been discarded long ago and old red tiles used instead. It stood right in the middle of a little Somerset village, and made the corner where a very minor road turned off from the main street. There was only a narrow strip of garden in front, and not very much behind, but we bought an orchard and outbuildings beyond so that we had about two acres in all. A high stone wall screened us from the village street, and there was a cottage and another orchard on the other side. Le jardin est visitable. De nouveaux propriétaires ont organisé la gestion de ce jardin extraordinaire, ils continuent la nursery organisée par Margery Fish en 1950 et vendent les plants et graines issus de ce jardin, comme elle avait fini par le faire, tant elle avait de demandes. The present owners, Gail and Mike Werkmeister, took over in 2008. The garden is open to the public regularly and some Royal Horticultural Society and Yeovil College horticulture courses are held there. [15] Books [ edit ] The iconic cottage garden at East Lambrook Manor is the creation of celebrated 20th-century plantswoman and gardening writer Margery Fish. Here she developed her own unselfconscious approach to gardening, combining both contemporary and old-fashioned plants in a relaxed and informal manner to create a garden of great beauty and charm. East Lambrook Manor Gardens is the iconic and quintessentially English cottage garden created by the celebrated 20th-century plantswoman and gardening writer Margery Fish. It was here that she developed her own style of gardening, combining old-fashioned and contemporary plants in a relaxed and informal manner to create a garden of immense beauty and charm.