Sissinghurst Place

A few patches of sun this afternoon allowed a visit to Sissinghurst Place, open for charity under the National Garden Scheme. The kindly owner greeted us in his deliciously battered panama with the words You do know youre not at Sissinghurst Castle dont you?.

We did and were allowed through what would once have been the entrance to a  very grand house, but now houses a swimming pool amongst ruined walls.

A fire in 1948 gutted the main house, leaving the owners to live, as our host put it: In the Servants Wing, but without the servants.  Vita Sackville-West apparently watched the fire and used it in her writing of The Easter Party.  

The Easter lambs were again gambolling happily in the field beyond the haha today, the hedges and woodland walks allowing frequent views out into the Kent countryside.

The gardens were a delightful mixture of formal structure and less formal shrubberies and bulbs planted into long grass, which Julie explained are gradually replacing  the more time-consuming beds and fiddly mowing areas.

The atmosphere of old world charm and elegance was only momentarily dented by my asking permission to include photographs of the garden in my blog.  They graciously agreed but for a moment I felt as though I had arrived from outer space!

For details of this and other gardens open for charity by very generous owners, please follow this link:
http://www.ngs.org.uk/