Ready for summer’s finale?! We spent a morning at Sarah Raven’s Cutting Garden recently and it was so inspiring. I have missed all the open days for the last few years so I was determined to get over to Burwash and get a heavy dose of flowers before autumn properly arrives.
On the 31st of August this year, the garden was open as part of the National Garden Scheme and we arrived super early and as keen as can be to get as much lens time as possible. We were first through the garden gate and greeted by an abundance of blooms and foliage glistening in the morning sunlight and heavy with dew.
I have just finished reading Adam Nicholson’s book – The Smell of Summer Grass: Pursuing Happiness at Perch Hill. I got lost in his brilliant writing and obsessed with all the country details and traditional land management ways. I loved the book. So much so, that I finally got my ass into gear to visit and see how Sarah and Adam (over 23 years) have turned this once dilapidated dairy farm into 90 acres of organic wonder and delight.
There are Dahlias as far as the eye can see and swathes of grasses and complementary flowers everywhere. Have you ever been? I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to get here?!
Jewel bright colours leaning in from all sides, tangles of clematis, nasturtiums and creepers..
Even this wheelbarrow full of colourful, not quite perfect prunings was a joy to see.
I dream of turning our wayward backyard into something rambling and beautiful. Taking inspiration from all my favourite gardens – the awesome plant and fruit combinations at Great Dixter, the wild meadow and orchards at Sissinghurst, the raw magic we found at the organic farm we stayed on in California, memories of hot summer days picking blackberries on the allotment my parents had when I was a child and a neat patch for a modest cutting garden inspired by our visit here. A merging of memories, dreams, reality and time old techniques.
This place really is amazing if you get a chance to visit, snap it up! I’ll let you wander on through the flowers uninterrupted now – have a beautiful day! x
