While in Derbyshire at the RHS Chatsworth Flower Show, I was invited to Chatsworth House to hear about plans to transform the historic garden.
There’s no doubt that everything about Chatsworth House is on a huge scale. The views are vast, the gardens cover 105 acres before you get to the 1,000-acre parkland and only at Chatsworth could 15 acres of garden be largely undeveloped. Until now that is.
A major transformation of the garden has started that will be the biggest since changes by Joseph Paxton more than 200 years ago. Initial work, covering more than 25 acres, will be complete in three years’ time.
It is, admits Steve Porter, Chatsworth’s Head of Gardens and Landscape, “an ambitious plan”.
The scheme includes revitalising the Rockery, altering planting around the famous maze, the Ravine, Trout Stream and Jack Pond in addition to Arcadia, the name given to the long-neglected 15 acres.
Rather than changing the essential character of the Derbyshire garden, which has been shaped by Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown as well as Paxton, the programme aims to enhance what’s already there.
“It’s adding new layer into the garden,” said Steve, adding: “A garden does not stand still.”
The project was launched with the 2015 Chelsea show garden by Dan Pearson, which took elements of Chatsworth House’s rock garden as the starting point for his design, winning Best in Show.
“The idea was always that it would kick start a new layer of gardening here at Chatsworth. We’ve taken the style and feel and spread it all along the Trout Stream.”
The stream ends at the Jack Pond, which is going to be redesigned as an oval pool, an easier shape to walk around, with a pavilion and seating for visitors.
Celebrated designer Tom Stuart-Smith is working with Steve on rejuvenating other areas of the garden. Already the Rockery, originally designed by Paxton and which has not been altered much since the 1960s, is being overhauled.
Tom described it as “one of the craziest bits of landscape making ever, anywhere.”
It’s certainly on a vast scale – 1.2 hectares in size with towering rocks. Work has begun to take out formal stone and wood edging, putting in rough stones instead, while over winter hundreds of tonnes of rock from the estate’s quarry were brought in.
Areas of grass, and overgrown trees and shrubs, such as cotoneaster, are being replaced by planting – the first phase saw 9,000 perennials alone. New plants include azalea, lilies, actaea and the unusual Skimmia anquetilia.
Elsewhere, what had been lupin beds near the Maze have been redesigned to give them more than just a few weeks of glory. They are now planted with a mix of herbaceous with yew topiary to echo the nearby maze.
“We’re trying to weave what we’re doing into the historic fabric,” commented Tom.
Possibly the most exciting part of the project is the plan to transform what has been named Arcadia. Set high up above the main garden, this is 15-acres of until now largely impenetrable woodland.
Work has started to clear overgrown yew and laurel, thinning trees, creating paths through and four glades that are going to be planted, in total around three to four-acres.
One that’s criss-crossed by streams is going to be a bog garden with primulas, iris and rodgersias. Others will have either a mixture of plants, over-sown with primroses and oxslips, or be completely seed-sown areas.
“It’s a trial of what you can achieve with very different techniques,” explained Tom.
There’s also a move to clear sightlines out into the formal garden, making the most of Chatsworth House’s long views. The work also includes putting in irrigation points, all fed from the streams that power Chatsworth’s famous water cascade and fountain.
At the moment, it’s still early days with clearing still going on and the planting only just begun but already it’s possible to see what it will be like when finished.
The Duke of Devonshire, whose family has been at Chatsworth House for nearly 500 years, is hoping the changes will be popular among visitors.
“I wanted to make more places for people to walk and a different sort of garden,” he told us.
Tom added: “When I came to Chatsworth House I had an overriding sense of the family doing things for the public good and creating something really extraordinary on a scale that’s very difficult for people to perceive.”
It seems this latest project is just the latest phase in that journey.
You can read about my visit to the 2019 RHS Chatsworth Flower Show here.