Spring at Kiftsgate Court Gardens

Wesley-Barrell chose Kiftsgate Court Gardens as a location for their latest Spring advertising.  

Above all Kiftsgate is a family home and has been since my grandparents Jack and Heather Muir bought the property in 1918.  At that time there was no garden and my grandmother was not a gardener.  However Lawrence Johnson had started to create the gardens at Hidcote Manor next door, and with his encouragement Heather began planting hedges and laying out the bones of the present garden today.

She had a natural colour sense, which is still seen in the borders with pinks and mauves together with yellows and blues in a separate area.  In the 1930's she tackled the very steep bank which faces west and with the help of Italian gardeners terraced its steep hillside to the lower garden some 200ft below.  My mother, Diany Binny, took over the garden in the fifties and added many of her own features and plants.  She in turn handed the baton on to me in the eighties and Johnny and I have now lived at Kiftsgate for 25 years bringing up our three children and working full time in the garden.  In 2000 we converted the run down tennis court into a water garden, very modern in design with no plants.  Simon Allison designed the elegant fountain with stainless steel stems topped with gilded bronze leaves that reflect well in the black water.

The garden is planted to reveal something to see at any time of the year.  In spring we look forward to the freshness of the new growth at the start of each season.  Both pink and white magnolias produce the first big splash of colour and bulbs and early perennials such as anemones and dogtooth violets provide the harmonies in the borders.

Nothing in the garden ever stands still and is always evolving and changing.  This is what makes it such fun to be able to continue but still be creating the garden year by year, and we feel lucky to have been able to continue the family commitment to this very special place.

To find out more about Kiftsgate please visit http://www.kiftsgate.co.uk/