Old Swan House Garden in June 2018

That garden is now almost at its peak in early June. The euphorbia no longer dominate as they have suffered the 'Chelsea Chop' but the roses have suddenly all come out and Mme Alfred Carriere is scrambling up the neighbour's yew, the roses having been properly pruned and tied back for the first time this winter.

The grasses have grown quickly after their hard pruning in March and the mounds of alchemilla have become astonishingly large. The fireworks of Stipa gigantea dominate at the moment before Miscanthus Professor Richard Hansen takes over as the tallest grass, becoming a golden searchlight in the autumn.

The wildflower meadow - probably the smallest in the country to be enclosed with estate fencing - is brimming with plants and has had had an additional supply of oxeye daisy and - hopefully - some teazle added to the mix, which now surrounds an old staddle stone.

The horse surveys the top of the garden and the addition box balls and pyramids

There is new box walk around the pond that looks particularly good lit up at night.

Only the lawns are a disappointment this year, but should soon be brought back to lush greeness.

For more photos, click here

For a video walk-through, click here

See also Blithe Moment


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Blithe Moment

There is a blithe moment in the gardening year when the frosts are past and all is in a state of becoming.
Nothing is dying or fallen, and little pruning is needed except to control exuberant growth.
Sweeping or tiding up is at its least insistent. And even the lawn seems not yet to grow so strongly.
That moment is sometime in early June when the breeze is gentle, and the garden seems suspended in
light. 

Chelsea Flower Show 2018

Spirit of Cornwall Designed by Stuart Charles Towner with Studio Evans Lane Sponsored by VTB Capital

South African Wine Estate Designed by Jonathan Snow Sponsored by Trailfinders Ltd

Omotenashi no Niwa -The Hospitality Garden by Kazuyuki Ishihara 

Designed by Nic Howard Sponsored by David Harber and Savills

  Eco-City Garden    Designed by Hay-Joung Hwang Built by Randle Siddeley

For all photos click here 

Favourite Writings - Love v Desire - JD McClatchy

A desire can be a vague wish, a sharp craving, a steadfast longing, a helpless obsession. It can signal an absence or a presence, a need or a commitment, an ideal or an impossibility. The root of the word “desire” links it to consider and to terms of investigation and augury, thereby reminding us that desire is often less what we feel than what we think about what we feel. And the still deeper root of the word links it to star and shine, as if our desires, and bright centers of our being, were also like the fixed fates in the heavens, determining the course of our lives. Indeed, our mundane experience of desire often coincides with this sense of something beyond our control, of something confusing, something driving us beyond the bounds of habit or reason. It is the heart of our hearts, the very stuff of the self. Desire explodes past borders of time or law. It drifts through veils of propriety. It cannot be confined by social expectations or strictures.

Love is something else again. As mysterious as are the ways of desire, and as disconcerting its effects, love is desire raised to a higher power. It can be as consuming as desire, but it lasts longer. Love is the quality of attention we pay to things. Love is both the shrine and the idol. Love is what we make of other people, and what they make of us. It can be as dispassionate as a Zen monk’s, or as wasting as the Romantic hero’s.

Love has nothing to do with behavior or circumstance. Love doesn’t require sexual expression, or even a meeting, just as it continues, often stronger, after the beloved’s death.

See also Favourite Writings - Friendship

Old Swan House Garden Video April 2018

Working in the garden April 2018

A video walk-though of the garden in April 2018

Favourite Writings - We Are All Chained To Fortune

We are all chained to fortune: the chain of one is made of gold, and wide, while that of another is short and rusty. But what difference does it make? The same prison surrounds all of us, and even those who have bound others are bound themselves; unless perchance you think that a chain on the left side is lighter. Honors bind one man, wealth another; nobility oppresses some, humility others; some are held in subjection by an external power, while others obey the tyrant within; banishments keep some in one place, the priesthood others. All life is slavery. Therefore each one must accustom himself to his own condition and complain about it as little as possible, and lay hold of whatever good is to be found near him. 

The wise man … does not need to walk about timidly or cautiously: for he possesses such self-confidence that he does not hesitate to go to meet fortune nor will he ever yield his position to her: nor has he any reason to fear her, because he considers not only slaves, property, and positions of honor, but also his body, his eyes, his hands, — everything which can make life dearer, even his very self, as among uncertain things, and lives as if he had borrowed them for his own use and was prepared to return them without sadness whenever claimed. 

Seneca

See also The Tale of Heike

Dedication in Hereford Cathedral of 'Ascension' for the SAS

'Ascension' by John Maine RA

A service was held in Hereford Cathedral on 17th October 2017 to dedicate a window and sculpture installed in honour of the SAS. The service was attended by the Duke of Cambridge who read from Paul's letter to the Ephesians. The Regimental Sergeant-Major read the SAS's poem from the epilogue of The Golden Journey to Samarkand by James Elroy Flecker

We are the Pilgrims, Master; we shall go
Always a little further; it may be
Beyond the last blue mountain barred with snow,
Across that angry or that glimmering sea...

After the traditional hymns, the company sang a stirring rendition of Lili Marlene.

Turner - Painting With Light

I have always loved Turner's paintings from afar but an exhibition of a few lovely pictures from the Tate at the Winchester Discovery Centre has made me understand why he is among the greatest artists of all time. And on 13th October, Nicola Moorby (formerly of the Tate) gave an absolutely fascinating lecture of the techniques Turner used to achieve his fabulous effects in light, some of which no one has been able to recreate since.

   

Favourite Writings - Big Wolf and Little Wolf

 I hadn't come across this marvellous little book by Nadine Brun-Cosme until Maria Popova wrote about it in her weekly Brain Pickings post. It reminded me immediately of the Story of the Fox from Le Petit Prince, which I have always loved. In it, the Fox tells the Little Prince how to make friends.

"You must be very patient" replied the fox. "First, you will sit down at a little distance from me - like that - in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstanding. But you will sit a little closer to me every day..."

The next day the little prince came back. "It would have been better to come back at the same hour" said the fox. "If, for example, you came at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o'clock, I shall already be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart is to be ready to greet you... 

Big Wolf, Little Wolf has much the same advice and 
That evening for the first time Big Wolf didn’t eat.
That night for the first time Big Wolf didn’t sleep.
He waited.
For the first time he said to himself that a little one, indeed a very little one, had taken up space in his heart
A lot of space.

For the whole book, click here

Favorite Writings - Friendship

I value friendship more highly than love, of which it is a part, perhaps the greatest part. It is free of the tiresome jealousies and overheated humours of love and does not need constant validation. David Whyte writes beautifully about it: 

Friendship is a mirror to presence and a testament to forgiveness. Friendship not only helps us see ourselves through another’s eyes, but can be sustained over the years only with someone who has repeatedly forgiven us for our trespasses as we must find it in ourselves to forgive them in turn. A friend knows our difficulties and shadows and remains in sight, a companion to our vulnerabilities more than our triumphs, when we are under the strange illusion that we do not need them. An undercurrent of real friendship is a blessing exactly because its elemental form is rediscovered again and again through understanding and mercy. All friendships of any length are based on a continued, mutual forgiveness. Without tolerance and mercy all friendships die.

The dynamic of friendship is almost always underestimated as a constant force in human life: a diminishing circle of friends is the first terrible diagnostic of a life in deep trouble: of overwork, of too much emphasis on a professional identity, of forgetting who will be there when our armored personalities run into the inevitable natural disasters and vulnerabilities found in even the most average existence. But no matter the medicinal virtues of being a true friend or sustaining a long close relationship with another, the ultimate touchstone of friendship is not improvement, neither of the other nor of the self, the ultimate touchstone is witness, the privilege of having been seen by someone and the equal privilege of being granted the sight of the essence of another, to have walked with them and to have believed in them, and sometimes just to have accompanied them for however brief a span, on a journey impossible to accomplish alone.

David Whyte

John O'Donoghue on Friendship

In the Celtic tradition, there is a beautiful understanding of love and friendship. One of the fascinating ideas here is the idea of soul-love; the old Gaelic term for this is anam cara. Anam is the Gaelic word for soul and cara is the word for friend. So anam cara in the Celtic world was the “soul friend.” In the early Celtic church, a person who acted as a teacher, companion, or spiritual guide was called an anam cara. It originally referred to someone to whom you confessed, revealing the hidden intimacies of your life. With the anam cara you could share your inner-most self, your mind and your heart. This friendship was an act of recognition and belonging. When you had an anam cara, your friendship cut across all convention, morality, and category. You were joined in an ancient and eternal way with the “friend of your soul.” The Celtic understanding did not set limitations of space or time on the soul. There is no cage for the soul. The soul is a divine light that flows into you and into your Other. This art of belonging awakened and fostered a deep and special companionship.


See also Love Undetectable by Andrew Sullivan