The next county organiser for the Gloucestershire National Garden Scheme opens her Winchcombe garden this week. I’ve been along to take a look.
Like many town centre gardens The Gate is a hidden surprise. From the busy Winchcombe street, there’s only a hint of what lies behind. A glimpse of a border with vibrant orange and purple blooms suggests an owner who loves flowers but the size of the plant-packed space is unexpected.
Typical of gardens in this Cotswold town it wraps itself around neighbouring houses with part entirely separate on the other side of the small drive.
It creates a garden of interesting shapes that have been used to good effect with small seating areas tucked away and changes in planting style.
In many ways, it was the garden that brought Vanessa Berridge and her husband, Chris Evans to the Winchcombe house. She had visited when it opened for the NGS with its previous owner. Later, when they were house-hunting in the area, she saw the house advertised for sale.
“If I had not been to see the garden, I would’ve actually thought the house was too big,” says Vanessa, who takes over the NGS county organiser role in the autumn. “Because I’d been to see the whole thing, I leapt at the chance.”
What they took on was a garden with strong structure, both in terms of the hard landscaping and numerous mature shrubs, perennials and trees, which help to shield the garden from nearby buildings.
Over this they have laid their own style with many of the plants acquired during Vanessa’s work as a gardening journalist and author. As we walk around, she points out things that have come from garden visits or been given to her by people she’s interviewed.
Many of these form part of the large collection of pots that are clustered in groups throughout the garden. There are salvias – including the entire ‘The Wishes’ series – that, too tender to live outdoors year-round, will be put into the greenhouse for the winter.
Elsewhere there are scented-leaf pelargoniums, an olive, pots of sweet peas, and even roses – I was taken with a flamboyant Rosa ‘Judy Garland’ that is thriving in a large container.
There’s a distinctly cottage-style to the garden with roses covering arches, and a jumble of familiar favourites, including penstemon, astrantia, acanthus, geraniums and nepeta.
At the height of June, the planting is exuberant with Alchemilla mollis, revelling in the sunshine, a frothy mass of limey-green (the hot sun making photography tricky). Alongside it, Vanessa has given up trying to tame Geranium ‘Orion’, which is covered in flowers. It is, she tells me, covering clipped box balls that will provide structure when the geranium is cut down.
She does colour theme: blues and mauves in one border, purple and red in a neighbouring bed that they created out of an original terrace, deciding there were enough places to sit in the garden.
And then there’s what she calls her “gaudy bed”, which I had spotted from the street. Here, there’s currently a glorious mix of purple, orange and pink, with the last flowers from Geum ‘Totally Tangerine’ and ‘Prinses Juliana’, a lipstick pink salvia, part of the original planting and name unknown, dark Salvia caradonna.
If the main garden has billowing planting, the vegetable garden is a formal contrast. Neat rows line the four raised beds with everything from beans and potatoes to strawberries and beetroot.
There are flowers for cutting and the surrounding walls have trained fruit trees, while the central greenhouse is full of plants for the open day.
I’ve walked past it numerous times but, like so many of the gardens in Winchcombe, it was until now a hidden secret.
• The Gate, Winchcombe opens for the National Garden Scheme on Sunday July 1, 2018, from 2-6pm along with St Mary’s. Combined admission is £6 and there will be teas and plants for sale. For more information, see the website.