Open Gardens Day
29th May 2022
10am to 4pm

We have now lived here for 37 years and the half acre garden has evolved over that time. The front garden was then overgrown and neglected but had been used for perhaps 200 years.  The back garden was then just part of a field with  barley growing. The soil here is basically a heavy, stiff, brown clay but years of cultivation and the addition of masses of compost, manure and wood ash has made it dark, granular and friable.  We have tried to keep it with a "cottage" style, productive, "organic" and "wildlife friendly".  Now it is becoming rather too large for us oldies to keep as trim as we once could - so we tend to grow more things that look after themselves, while the edges are creeping in on us and some tasks are no longer attempted.  We do have help with our "lawns" and hedges from two very helpful people. We grow enough fruit and veg to have some surplus for sale, with the cash going to the local food bank each year.  We are running out of steam so changes will come with future owners. Enjoy looking around but see it as in the end stage of a gardening cycle.

A cottage style garden: with an orchard of eating and cooking apples. There are borders, gardens with shrubs, bulbs, annuals, perennials and vegetables. The vegetables are grown on no dig organic raised beds and the compost supplied from composts heaps. The greenhouse is for summer tomatoes, cucumbers and winter lettuce. Two small ponds for wildlife, evergreens for all year colours and no weeds only native plants!

The front is rather too full of apple trees, and mainly spring flowers, with most of the colour and on-going interest reserved for the rear garden. We hope that this year the opening will coincide with the blooming of our peony collection. Plant sale from 10am and tea and cake will be served from 2pm.

Open 12 until 4pm. Lawns, fruit and vegetable garden, flower beds, field with apple orchard

A small, interesting cottage garden with mixed borders and raised beds. A wisteria covered arbour may be blooming with racemes reaching up to a metre long. Various seating areas to catch the sun and quirky garden features. A new addition this year are cut flowers beds with plants raised by us from seed.

A small stone walled cottage garden with several borders filled with a wide range of shrubs, perennials and bedding plants. We also hope to be able to offer a selection of plants for sale on the day grown from seed in our greenhouse, all money raised to go to the Trust

Opening Times 10.30 - 4pm

The Magnolias has quite a large rear garden. The garden contains a large workshop, 2 x greenhouses, a small shed, large lawn, 2 x ponds and a vegetable patch.

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The lawn has suffered in the past 3 years due to dry conditions. It is in the process of being rescued, and still remains weed free! The ponds are quite large, and are linked by a small waterfall. The bottom, larger pond has about 100 fish, including 2 large ghost koi and a large golden orfe. The top pond is supposed to be for wildlife (newts and frogs), but has been invaded with about 12 small fish, which have so far eluded capture!

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The patio has about 20 pots which have been recently planted with annuals. The pots are largely made up of our own compost, and all the plants were grown from seed in our propagator (in the workshop) and greenhouses.

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The large greenhouse is largely for growing tomatoes (and housing Matilda the tortoise, when she is not escaping!). The raised bed was a lockdown project and is in its second season with lettuce, carrots, beetroot, leeks, purple sprouting and Brussel sprouts plants.

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The main veg plot is almost full with a variety of vegetables and rhubarb. In addition, carrots are grown in the bath at the rear of the greenhouse, raspberries to the side of the greenhouse, and blackcurrants in the 4 bushes dotted around the plot.

Being just over an acre, there is much to see; previous owners made some interesting plantings and we have added our own. If it is not too far from the others on the route and well worth visiting. As we have plenty of space, there is ample parking.

Complete new design and build from grass only and some border trees in 2007 by Kathryn Crouch, BBC Garden designer of the Decade in 1999.

We have lived at Manor House for 21 years and have been developing the garden ever since. It is a mixture of flower beds , which surround the main lawn ,a vegetable growing area and a couple of elderly apple trees. The lower lawn which has a small wild life pond supports frogs , newts , dragonflies and damsel flies . To the north of the main garden is a wild flower paddock. With our advancing years we have decided to concentrate on making the whole garden a little more manageable !