Painswick Rococo Garden visited on 2/02/2012

Looking across the Kitchen Garden to the Exedra Gothic feature.

Rococo Gardens are generally associated with France and Italy. However, the style did travel to England, and the only complete Rococo Garden surviving is in the Cotswold's at Painswick.The garden dates from the mid 18th century when gardens were being created almost as theatrical sets into which period gentlefolk would take their house guests. They were designed as pleasure grounds, with surprises and flamboyant eccentricities at every turn. These were not the gardens of great plant collectors but more of the decadent and fun-loving side of society.The great French and Italian gardens were filled with pavilions, fountains, and flights of steps cascading with water. Some of the gardens created used bizarre and extravagant ideas such as large and elaborate  fantastasy Grottoes decorated with rocaille worked figures (made out of shells). However, they did fuel a fleeting craze in England. The English gardens which, although never as grand as their European cousins, showcased their often ostentatious owners wealth. Modern eyes, which are familiar with the great herbaceous borders, vivid planting schemes and arboretums of the 19th and 20th century, sometimes struggle to understand a Rococo Garden. These mid 18th century gardens are not about collections of plants but rather a place where plants become part of the furnishings of a gilded and rather flamboyant outdoor room in which to entertain. Perhaps most important was the creation of vistas and intersections, not directed exclusively to one particular point in the scheme but rather intended to lead the eye in various directions from the surrounding landscape to follies, statuary and water features.

The asymmetrical Red House

The Beech Walk leading to the Exedra

Looking through the Gothic arches across the round pool towards the Kitchen Garden

View to the Exedra with its Gothic arches over the maize. The maize is not an original feature of the garden, but planted in 1998 to celebrate a painting done of the garden by Thomas Robins in 1748. The painting was invaluable during the restoration of the garden, along with archaeological evidence unearthed during the course of the restoration.  

 

The maize reads 250 representing the 250 years since the painting of the garden was done.

The empty pedestals have pots of flowers on them in the Summer. The wire netting is to keep the rabbits out!

The Kitchen Garden - rather sparse in February!

The Spring fed Plunge Pool - said to be chilly all year round.

Seating folly - a touch of rustic Palladio 

The fish pond looking towards the Exedra and the Red House leading the eye into the surrounding landscape. The pond is wearing a thin layer of ice.

Arched walkway to the ancient woods.

The pink Eagle House

Inside the Bothy

The Red House from the top path.

The vista from the Red House, looking out into the surrounding landscape beyond.  
A few winter flowers showing in the garden.

Aconites

Cyclamen

Snowdrops

In architecture, an Exedra is a semi-circular recess, often crowned by a semi-dome, which is usually set into a building's facade. The original Greek sense (a seat out of doors) was applied to a room that opened on to a Stoa, ringed with curved high-backed stone benches, a suitable place for a philosophical conversation. An Exedra may also be expressed by a curved break in a colonnade, perhaps with a semi-circular seat.

A Stoa is another Greek architectural term meaning a safe, protective place where people can gather.