outings – Page 2 – Charlton and Blackheath Amateur Horticultural Society

A visit to Great Dixter, July 2025

Fresh off a flight from America, Fergus Garrett addressed approximately 300 people seated on hay bales in the Plant Fair Field, in one of the regular Friends events held at Great Dixter. He had returned that morning from a 20 day stay, lecturing and touring, with some of the stay devoted to Chanticleer. Fergus drew comparisons between the gardening practice there and at Great Dixter. At Chanticleer they artificially oxygenate their compost heaps to accelerate the process, whereas at Dixter these are left to decompose naturally. He also drew attention to how little water is used at Dixter – at most, the Long Border has been watered three times this year – but at Chanticleer watering is a regular feature of garden maintenance.

A Trip to Audley End

On a very hot Friday in July we set off on a CABAHS coach trip to Saffron Waldon in Essex, to visit Audley End House and Gardens.

The Audley End site was originally a Benedictine monastery, but following the Dissolution of the Monasteries the land was acquired by Thomas Howard, 1st Earl of Suffolk between 1604 and 1612, who built a very grand house on the site on a par with a royal palace. It has been altered and added to throughout the years, and the grounds were originally designed by Launcelot ‘Capability’ Brown in the usual parkland style of the time, together with a temple in the distance.

Our group decided to visit the Parterre first at the side of the house. There were beautifully shaped beds and lovely planting just humming with bees, hoverflies and butterflies. Plants included lavenders, Nepeta, day lilies and Phlomis which were being watered in the very hot sun.

A visit to Long Barn Gardens, Kent

The courtyard at Long Barn Gardens, June 2025

Among the services offered by Perennial are a range of garden tours, many to gardens which are not often open to the public. Long Barn Gardens is one of those. Harold Nicolson and Vita Sackville-West bought Sissinghurst in 1930, but for 15 years before that they lived at Long Barn and it is interesting to look for the elements here which they later expanded and refined at Sissinghurst. On the edge of the village of Sevenoaks Weald, the garden has retained its long views over wooded countryside and has been the family home of Rebecca Lemonius and her husband who have lived here since 2007.

Like the house itself, the garden has developed as a kind of hotch-potch with bits added on over the years and there is a wonderful informality and intimacy about the place. Rebecca emphasises that although they garden with Vita Sackville-West’s ethos and style in mind, the emphasis is on the atmosphere which she created.

Have you been to Beckenham Place Park lately?

Signpost in Beckenham Place Park, April 2024

Not too far away (and on the 54 bus route from Charlton and Blackheath!) lies a ‘new’ old park: Beckenham Place Park. The name can be confusing – it lies on the border between the London Boroughs of Bromley and Lewisham, but is run by Lewisham Council. It is larger than you might think, at 96 hectares (well over 200 acres), and stretches from Beckenham Hill railway station in the north to Ravensbourne railway station in the south, west into Beckenham ‘proper’ and east toward Bromley.

Beckenham Place Park information sign (2024) — Park map with trails: download

Beloved of dogwalkers, wild swimmers, park runners, bluebell spotters and vintage shoppers, since Heritage Lottery Funding was awarded in 2016 there have been many changes and a huge increase in community use. Old features of the 18^th century estate have been brought back, playgrounds added and the 1762 mansion (which was formerly a golf club house with a small visitor centre) is now home to artists’ studios, a café, a vintage shop and hosts multiple events.

But to the gardens…

A Visit to RHS Harlow Carr

Jean and I were very sorry to miss the (highly successful) plant fair on 19 May but we did have a lovely visit to the fabulous garden at RHS Harlow Carr instead.

Sycamore sculpture, RHS Harlow Carr, May 2025

RHS Harlow Carr is a short drive or bus ride away from Harrogate, a very elegant spa town in North Yorkshire. The garden opened in 1950 with the intention of trialling and showcasing plants that would thrive in a northern climate as opposed to the possibly easier growing conditions of RHS Wisley.

Keukenhof, April 2025

I returned to Keukenhof for a brief visit again this year. Transport in the Netherlands makes this a very easy trip and it is well worth making a stopover in Haarlem, which is a lovely town. I have little to add to the descriptions of my previous visits (April 2022, April 2023) so have just included a selection of photos which lovers of colour and tulips might enjoy!

Vija V

Visit to the Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh

I spent a weekend this February in Edinburgh, and came across this interesting doorstep display on my travels around the city. Some new ideas for displaying your succulents …!

I also visited the Royal Botanic Garden. The morning I visited was bright, cold and calm, in stark contrast to the previous weekend when the garden had been ravaged by storm Eowyn. The sad remains of the garden’s tallest tree – a 166 year-old conifer – were clear to see.

The sun was shining and the sky a bright blue but the frost remained in the shadier parts of the beds and the Rhododendrons had bowed their leaves to protect themselves from the cold. But they were also covered in buds, waiting to burst forth in a few weeks time.

Outing to Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew for Orchid display

This year’s Orchid display, based on the beauty of Peru, is being show-cased in the Princess of Wales Conservatory. The display is absolutely stunning and should not be missed.

The glasshouse is divided in two sections: the arid, dry zone, featuring cacti and succulents; and the lush, tropical zone. Within the dry zone several large containers of orchids and hanging orchid planters are on display but it’s the tropical zone that contains the main display and you won’t be disappointed.

Inspired by the Peruvian flag and coat of arms, the display centres on a cornucopia (an ornamental goat-horn), overflowing with orchids, to signify the abundance of mineral wealth of Peru. Adjacent (keeping guard?) stands a distant relative of the alpaca.

Belfast Botanic Gardens

I have been spending some time recently in Northern Ireland, and was enchanted to find the Belfast Botanic Gardens are right on my doorstep here.. just waiting to be explored.

The gardens started in 1828, when the “Belfast Botanic and Horticultural Society” was formed and a 14 acre site purchased. The Palm House was built in 1839 by ironmaster Richard Turner of Dublin, who went on to build the Palm House at Kew a few years later! If this one was a practice run, it is still really impressive.

It is not large, but cleverly designed to incorporate a Cool Wing, a central Dome which is sub-tropical, and a Tropical wing, so it can house a wide range of plants. Sadly it was closed for repairs on the day of my visit, courtesy of the recent winter storms.

There is another glasshouse on the site, the Tropical Ravine House, which is just amazing. It was built by “the Head Gardener and his staff” (Jason & the Garden volunteers – there’s an idea!) and was finished in 1889. Uniquely constructed into a hillside, so the visitor walks around a balcony and looks down into a moist glen filled with tropical planting.

It was renovated in 2019 with help from the Friends of Belfast Botanic Gardens, who clearly play a large part in supporting and maintaining these gardens. They have also created a fascinating new Global Medicine Garden just to the side of the glasshouse. https://fobbg.co.uk/

The Exchange, Walnut Tree Road, Erith

One autumn Saturday morning in 2024 my companion and I visited the Sarah Price-designed garden at The Exchange in Erith, South-East London and we were in for a treat.

As Erith Library for over 100 years, and Grade II-listed, this Carnegie-financed building of 1906 finally closed its doors in 2009, thus becoming an unused space with unkept grounds. Two visionary locals, respectively with conservation and community arts experience, approached Bexley Council in 2016. Their initiative resulted in a community arts hub which opened in 2022 – a refurbished building with a new garden to match.

The garden surrounds the building on all sides, with various plantings complementing each of the four different areas. The forefront of the building has become a Mediterranean garden with a tapestry of lime-greens, blue-greens and greys. In amongst the herbaceous and shrubs I noticed Myrtle, Euphorbias, Irises, California poppies and particular favourites, sub-shrub Dorycnium hirsutum and several Hesperaloe parviflora (red yucca), a very choice succulent that I have at home (and managed to keep alive!). On our visit we noticed that flowering was just finishing, with its tall stem of red-orange pendulum flowers just going over.