The Victorian Walled Garden at Edmonsham House

Last Wednesday was another grey, drizzly day. In the afternoon we drove up into Dorset, to see the gardens at Edmondsham House, in a hamlet just north of Verwood. The house is of Tudor origins and has Georgian additions. The gardens and parkland reflect this long history. There are the steeply grassed banks of a cock fighting pit from the Middle Ages. There are fine specimen trees and a pond in a shaded dell.
On our visit, it was the sheltered and colourful beauty of the Victorian walled garden that gave us the greatest pleasure on an otherwise damp and dull summer`s afternoon.

Delphiniums and other herbaceous perennials thrive on the alkaline soil of this landscape, which is at the southern edge of the chalk hills of Cranborne Chase.

Contrasting drifts of nepeta ( catnip) and acid green Alchimella mollis.

Soft grasses and flowering perennials border the gravel pathways.

There are scented  shrub roses

Several varieties of delicate cranesbill geraniums flower in clumps beside the path.

A deeply scented rose.

I liked the dark bronze leave of this rose. A lovely contrast to the surrounding brighter greens.

A climbing rose against the lichen covered red brick wall.

A Victorian chimney pot.

A large part of the walled garden is now an organic kitchen garden, carefully managed by the Gardener and his team. Short courses in organic gardening are sometimes held here.

A domesticated wild flower, Vipers bugloss, is part of the companion planting scheme that attracts bees and beneficial insects to the garden. Calendula and borage are also grown.

The outside of the walled garden, as seen from the lawn beside the house. Several climbing roses have been trained along the wall. One of the loveliest was a pale creamy apricot rose, with a sweet scent, that arched across the warm red brickwork at the end of this fine old wall.