End of Season Garden photos

 In October, the gardens staff were involved with hedge cutting the perimeter hedges in the North Garden and the formal parterre in this area, which is a restoration of the original Beighton prospect dating back to 1726.  I took this view of the North Garden from a Henchman platform and ladder to give a perspective of the layout.  Originally the area was designed to have been viewed from the Castle Bromwich Hall, via the windows above the North Courtyard.

North Garden Parterre

The Maltese Cross parterre illustrated below is planted out in box hedging and was restored by the Trust to illustrate this intricate and formal style of box hedging.  The aim is to grow herbs and annuals in the raised beds in the centre of the borders.

Maltese Cross Parterre

The Garden has a good range of autumn colour.  This tree Juglans nigra (Black Walnut) is in our New Orchard area (outside the Walled Garden).  It was introduced to the UK in 1634 from E.N America, and is now a well established tree in our orchard, with good autumn colour.

Juglans nigra

Chris Hitchcock

November 2013









A Visit from Solihull Police

We recently had the honour of being the location for the latest video presentation by the Chief Superintendent of Solihull Police, Sally Bourner. Here she talks to our Head Gardener, Chris Hitchcock.

Solhull Police is a good friend to both the gardens and to our local community, and they are holding an open day at Chelmsley Wood Police station on 14th September between 10:00 am and 4:00 pm.

To quote Sally: 

"There will be all sorts of fun, frolics and interesting things to see and do including stalls and activities from local communities and partnerships and displays from ourselves, Fire and Ambulance services. You can buy cakes, burgers, ice cream, tea and coffee. And if you’re really brave, having stuffed yourself full of food, you can have a go at sparring with our own local World Champion boxer, the one and only Wayne Elcock. I am delighted that The Mayor of Solihull and the West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner will be joining us on the day. So please come along, say hello and see what we all do."

As the Police (like so many other essential services) are not usually thought about until they are actually needed, the Open Day is a valuable opportunity to meet the people who help protect us all both day and night.

You can also keep in touch via Twitter @SolihullPolice

Meanwhile, here is the video. Enjoy!

Lady Bridgeman's Corporate Clean-Up!

We were visited recently by a group of Corporate Volunteers from LLoyds TSB operting via Sustain. The group worked on tidying up the Lady Bridgeman Garden, and very good it looks too! 
 

If you are interested in spending a corporate team-build day at ths Gardens, please contact us. Not only will you be most welcome, we can also promise you will have a great day. You will also be helping us greatly in out task in maintaining the Gardens for future generations to enjoy.

Many thanks to the group from Lloyds TSB for all their hard work!
 

Photographs by Graham High and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

1940's Event - 12 May 2013.

Guards patrolling the new secret military base. Ssh!

Castle Bromwich briefly returned to wartime readiness on Sunday 12^th May 2013 with the return of the 1940's event at Castle Bromwich Hall Gardens. This time another enemy was faced; namely our Spring weather which still had strong elements of late Winter about it. Nevertheless both visitors and re-enactors packed up their troubles in an old kit-bag and smiled their way through, usually in 1940s costume!

Highlights of the event included a display of vintage military and private vehicles:

The home guard also showed up, ever vigilant against fifth columnists and spies:

C'mon Adolf if you think you're hard enough...

Private Pike guarding the bike.

To help us mark the 75th anniversary of the 'Dam-Busters' raid, a temporary war-room was set up. Our classroom was suddenly transformed into RAF Neethley, and visitors sat through a number of air-raid scenarios therein:

 
The RAF tracking options proved to be most effective:

Here's one we pranged earlier!

Needless to say the public were well prepared for any incursion from the enemy:

Everyone knew where they were:

The US Army Medics were on hand:

 The shops were still open:

 ... and our dedicated Land Girls carried on regardless.

 
Of course all problems were eventually solved by jolly decent brew-up:

In the meantine Peggy Skivvy was on hand doing the essential job of the laundry, and telling just about everyone about how she went about it:

 
Sadly the weather prevented me from filming her talk this year, so here's one I filmed earlier:

I did however manage to film some of the quality entertainment provided by Kevin Mack just before the heavens opened on us:

In what seems to be a habit at our 1940s events, everyone had a great time in spite of the weather. Smiling faces abounded everywhere, and the event was the talking point of the area for days afterwards. Thank you all for your support.

I would also like to thank all of the visitors, exhibitors, and re-enactors for providing the Gardens with an event that I strongly suspect will be one of the highlights of 2013.

Special thanks must go to Professor Carl Chinn for promoting this event so brilliantly on BBC Radio WM. It was an extremely generous gesture.

Again, where would this event have been without the stirling work of our volunteers? Huge thanks to everyone involved: You were all great. If you are intrested in helping to keep these historic gardens open for the benefit of future generations see our volunteers page on this blog, then please contact Sue Brain on 0121 749 4100.

STOP PRESS! More pictures available from this site!

The video and photographs were taken by Graham High and are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Rare Plant Fair - 5th May 2013

A sunny day (rare enough right now, let's be honest) greeted our visitors to this year's Rare Plant Fair held at the Gardens on May 5th.

Much trade in rare and beautiful plants was done in this happy combination of Spring atmosphere and magnificent historic surroundings (Click on the pictures to view them full size):

The Gardens (after a short delay due to the late arrival of Spring this year) erupted with new and fresh beauty. Everywhere you looked gave a fresh feast for the senses:

 

A very happy and successful event was had by all, puchasers were happy with their items, and sellers reported a healthier than usual sales-to-advice ratio! 

A big thank you goes to our friends and exhibitors at the Rare Plant Fair for helping to make this event such fun yet again.

The biggest thanks of all must go to our visitors for their loyal support in helping us to keep these gardens alive for the benefit of both present and future generations. If you have not visited us yet, don't hesitate. The gardens have to been seen 'in the flesh colour and scent' to be fully appreciated: These pictures cannot do the place full justice.

Once again without the unstinting practical support of our volunteers, this event would not have taken place at all. Why not join them? If you are tempted to become a volunteer, please click on our volunteer page. For further details contact Sue Brain on 0121 749 4100. You won't regret it, and you'll be helping to make a difference that will be appreciated for generations to come!

The photographs taken by Graham High, and are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.