Aberglasney

Back in February, I posted about taking Anna to the National Botanical Garden of Wales. I said there that we were planning a further trip to Aberglasney when Spring arrived (and I needed to be in Anna's good books again). I am going off for the weekend to the International XT Meet, so I reckoned a quid pro quo would be a day going round some gardens. Yesterday, the forecast was for showers only (i.e. at the dry end of Welsh weather arrangements) and I had the day off work, so off we went. Good choice, it was.

Aberglasney is the site of a house which was owned by the descendants of Elystan Glorydd and the grand-daughter of Hywel Dda in mediaeval times and passed to the Rudd family around 1600. Bishop Rudd reconstructed the house in 1603 and laid out some formal Elizabethan gardens. The house was then bought by Robert Dyer, a successful Carmarthen lawyer, and substantially rebuilt in the Queen Anne style. Dyer's descendants got into debt, and the house was bought and sold several times until it was abandoned in 1908. It was commandeered during the second World War as a holding station for US troops in the run-up to D-Day, and was inhabited briefly, but in the 1950s the estate was sold and broken up. The house was neglected and vandalised, but in 1995 was taken over by the Aberglasney Restoration Trust, and work began to restore the gardens and house. The work in the gardens was a combination of horticulture and archaeology, but painstaking efforts led to the uncovering of Elizabethan and Jacobean goundworks which are now revealed and restored to their former glory.

We first visited Aberglasney around ten years ago, when restoration work had only just started, and the gardens were still being excavated and the house only a shell. The gardens now are beautiful, and work on the house is progressing. Most of the house is inaccessible to the public and I don't know to what extent there are plans to restore the whole structure, but one superb innovation is the construction of a 'ninfarium' in the ruined courtyard in the centre. The area has been roofed in with glass and a variety of large and small sub-tropical plants have been installed. It's very impressive. A few photos and comments follow.

The house at Aberglasney - the Queen Anne facade



The Cloister Garden with arcaded stone surround, supporting a parapet walkway, and original Elizabethan chequerboard cobbles



Detail of Elizabethan floor surface - amazing to walk on this and reflect how long ago the cobbles were laid and who has walked there since



View through the arcade to the Pond



Raindrops on a hosta leaf



Upper Walled Garden, laid out according to the archaeology



Delicious lunch in the Tea Rooms



Interior of the Ninfarium



Plaque to commemmorate the Cabots, American benefactors whose generosity allowed the restoration to happen



Preserving the house interior



I reckon it's an Iris, but I am told it isn't. By those what know. It's beautiful anyway.



The visit was enhanced by an art exhibition in the two habitable rooms on the ground floor of the house. Two local artists, Glenn Ibbitson and Carole King (no, not that Carole King) had their work on show and it was fabulous. I got chatting to Glenn and it turns out he is a Leeds lad (like me) and spent a lot of time in Hull (like I have). He's about my age, but the years didn't match, so there were no "ah, that must have been you!" moments. He's another 'ex-biker' - got as far as a Honda Superdream and then moved to London and never looked back. His work ranged from superbly-drawn landscapes to semi-impressionist interiors, and I liked it all. That's from someone who is very wary of 'modern art' - the man can paint, and paint extremely well. His partner's work was more small-scale and delicate, using fragments of maps and collages, and was delightful. I went back in when we had finished the tour of the garden, as it is our Wedding Anniversary coming up soon, and I know Anna would have loved a lavender-coloured interior piece that we had both admired. At £750, it was not even in mad impulse purchase territory, but we took his business card and phone number and we will see if we can find something more affordable at a later time. His work can be seen here.

Aberglasney, highly recommended.

Botanicals

Monday was Anna's birthday, and for once I did something right. (Something wrong was the year I forgot both our wedding anniversary and her birthday. It took a long time to live that one down.)

As a complete surprise, I took her for a trip to the National Botanic Gardens of Wales at Llanarthney. She's able to walk better these days, so I planned a modest trip round the gardens, followed by lunch in their restaurant. This was apparently a majorly good decision, combining as it does gardeny stuff, a trip out, and food. I arranged for a wheelchair to be available, but it wasn't needed.



View from the entrance, January colours, dome in background.

We last visited the Gardens in 2000, not long after it opened. Back then, it was plain that the project had huge potential, but there was little to see other than some magnificent structural designs and an ambitious plan. It had a hard time getting established, and has been notably less successful than, for example, the Eden Project. I wonder if the rather clumsy name has had something to do with this - it certainly doesn't have the zip of 'Eden'. However, it has made steady progress and is now the most visited garden in Wales.



Inside the dome.



This is a plant, I think. Very pretty.

If you have zero interest in gardening, as I do, then visiting gardens like this can be a bit of a struggle, an exercise in feigning interest until the bar opens. But I can recommend the NBGW to anyone. There's plenty of architectural interest, from an unusual double-walled garden to the magnificent dome that arches over the main exhibits. The staff are unfailingly friendly, keen and involved, food in the restaurant was excellent, and they served me a very good pint of Reverend James. Always a way to my heart.

The most memorable feature for me (remember, zero interest) is the drainage of the main path. The water collects in a large pond at the top of the slope and runs in a sinuous, winding culvert a few inches deep down the path. It crosses and recrosses the pathway, occasionally vanishing underneath, and you are always aware of its presence. The culvert is shallow and lined with white stones, so it is easy to see. It ends in a spiral trench which curls in on itself in the form of an ammonite shell before disappearing into the ground. It's a spectacular idea and well-executed. It was dry when we were there this week, but in a storm I imagine it would be endlessly fascinating.



It was designed by Kathryn Gustafson, who designed the Princess Di memorial fountain in Hyde Park, but this one has not had to be closed to the public for 'safety reasons'. It's simply stunning.

Everywhere you go in the gardens, there are little surpises awaiting you.



Close by is the house and garden of Aberglasney. This is a house which had fallen into complete disrepair, damp and vandalised, and the garden had become a jungle. Restoration began in 1995, and the restoration of the garden has been closer to archaeology than horticulture. There is an Elizabethan/Jacobean garden in there, on the way to being fully returned to its original form and planting. I'm not a gardener, but history and archaeology light my fire, and I'm looking forward to returning there. When we were last up this way, we did both in a day, but that would have been too much now. However, it does leave something in the shot locker for when I next need to be in Anna's good books.