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Our lovely relic

The Periploca graeca (silk vine) is our relic from Peto’s enormous treillage pergolas across the croquet lawn. It is covered in these lovely small purple flowers, which then turn into oversized silk lined seed pods. It is in a lovely shady spot, so ...

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The wonder of alliums

This week volunteers worked really hard to ready the Gardens for the Open Day this Sunday, 22 June. Weeding to allow the alliums to get star billing. Also looking lovely are the last tulips, the first roses and the helianthemum borders in the Italian gard ...

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What a year for tulips

The daffodils are withering early this year in the hot dry April weather, but the tulips are thriving, bringing fantastic splashes of colour to the Italian garden. In the Glade there are cowslips all over the place, orchids are coming up in the grass and ...

Feb 22

Woodchips galore

The one good thing about storms is that the fallen trees generate plenty of woodchips to spread to soak up the puddles. That’s OK for the car park, but it doesn’t help with the waterlogged grass of the croquet lawn and the Glade, so with huge ...

027 2022 02 10

Snowdrops in the green

What a busy day… lifting snowdrops in the green ready for sale at the first Snowdrop Open Day, this Sunday 13th February, and lots and lots of tidying of the Gardens so they look at their best. The snowdrops are bang on schedule, with swathes fully ...

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The snowdrops are coming!

The snowdrops are everywhere – they have spread and we have helped them along! Yesterday Petra was at the Gardens and set up this lovely photo of snowdrops on one of the old brackets in the kitchen wall. Her photocards will be on sale at the Gardens ...

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Larking

We get a lot done on volunteer days at the Gardens – and have fun too! This week we spread out around the Gardens in a big push to tidy up and get ready for this Sunday’s final Open Day of the season. We have picked and cleaned the pumpkins an ...

Dig for Victory

RHS exhibition put in place

Despite the heat this week, we got some tidying done in advance of the Open Day on Sunday and today we put the RHS exhibition in place. At the Open Day we will remember the role of the Countess and Gardens in WWI and the men and women of the airbase in WW ...

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What a picture!

We mostly had a lovely day for Essex Gardens Trust‘s Tour and Draw group and they spread around the Gardens, sketching with charcoal. It is inspiring to see what others can do!! Meanwhile, we managed our first big picking of fruit for jellies and ja ...