Tag Archives: ruins

“Oh, a dainty plant is the ivy green…”

Posted on 19/12/2020 by The Gardens Trust

Writing a post for Christmas is never easy… unless there is an obvious  monstrosity to write about as there was in 2017 [check it out if you have managed to blank it from your mind!]  It would be easier  if … Continue reading →

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Beaudesert: “a desert beautified”

Posted on 27/07/2019 by The Gardens Trust

Beaudesert is/was  an enormous estate in Staffordshire’, its name probably coming from the French for  the surrounding landscape – “beautiful wilderness”.  It has a reasonably well recorded architectural and contents history up to the demolition of the great Elizabethan mansion … Continue reading →

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Visiting a Duke 18thc style…

Posted on 09/02/2019 by The Gardens Trust

At the end of last year I wrote  about the travel journals of John Byng, 5th Viscount Torrington. His diaries are, unlike most 18thc published writing, quite informal in style , probably because he  had no intention of putting his … Continue reading →

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The Glastonbury Thorn

Posted on 22/12/2018 by The Gardens Trust

One of the things that historians like to boast about is their devotion to evidence.  Facts without corroboration are merely assertions. Good stories without witness statements or documentary support are just that: good stories.  The further back in time one … Continue reading →

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Mrs Delany’s Petticoat

Posted on 07/07/2018 by The Gardens Trust

I write about all sorts of strange things on this blog but can’t think of much more obscure than this week’s starting point which is a Georgian firescreen which turns out not to be just a firescreen but part of … Continue reading →

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