Coming Home
The thrill of coming home has never changed.
To me, November is everything about the home. We are preparing our homes for the shorter days and longer dark nights; settling in so to speak with a good book and a cup of cocoa in front of the fire. November is also all about the family and food and sharing. So through November I will share tidbits about the home and some fascinating photos of homes around the world. Enjoy!
Do Not Sit Home
Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.
Dale Carnegie
To me, November is everything about the home. We are preparing our homes for the shorter days and longer dark nights; settling in so to speak with a good book and a cup of cocoa in front of the fire. November is also all about the family and food and sharing. So through November I will share tidbits about the home and some fascinating photos of homes around the world. Enjoy!
Quiet Morning
This nation will remain the land of the free, only so long as it is the home of the brave.
To me, November is everything about the home. We are preparing our homes for the shorter days and longer dark nights; settling in so to speak with a good book and a cup of cocoa in front of the fire. November is also all about the family and food and sharing. So through November I will share tidbits about the home and some fascinating photos of homes around the world. Enjoy!
Italy
If you’re not happy at home, you’re not happy anywhere else.
To me, November is everything about the home. We are preparing our homes for the shorter days and longer dark nights; settling in so to speak with a good book and a cup of cocoa in front of the fire. November is also all about the family and food and sharing. So through November I will share tidbits about the home and some fascinating photos of homes around the world. Enjoy!
Christmas at Indianapolis Airport
I’m on the road again, so here are two quick pics today. It’s Christmas at the Indianapolis Airport! All the light comes from the doors and windows! I have to say this is a fantastic airport! Everything is on time and everyone is so helpful and courteous!
IUPUI Student Union
I’m touring IUPUI (Indiana University/ Purdue University, Indianapolis) where all the light comes through the doors and maybe a very narrow window! Having a great time! See you next week!
This is just one of many photos in the Thursday Door Collection featured by Norm2.0! Won’t you join in or take a peak at all the doors?
Great Dixter, East Sussex, UK
Here is my first entry for the “Good Fences” Photo Challenge! Every year I do my own English Garden Tour of selected gardens in the UK. This is a handmade fence at Great Dixter Manor and Gardens in East Sussex. I chose this photo because it showed part of the manor house, the wildness of this section of the garden and the use of old limbs and twigs for fencing! Enjoy!
See more about the Challenge Here!
A Home in Madison, GA
Never make your home in a place. Make a home for yourself inside your own head. You’ll find what you need to furnish it – memory, friends you can trust, love of learning, and other such things. That way, it will go with you wherever you journey.
Tad Williams
I don’t know, I guess I want the brass ring and have it all! I’d like to take this home memory wherever I go, plus have a home inside my head, wouldn’t you?
To me, November is everything about the home. We are preparing our homes for the shorter days and longer dark nights; settling in so to speak with a good book and a cup of cocoa in front of the fire. November is also all about the family and food and sharing. So through November I will share tidbits about the home and some fascinating photos of homes around the world. Enjoy!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Previously we learned the history of Great Dixter and today we will continue our walk around the grounds and gardens. Apart from a couple of mixed orchards and a scattering of trees, there were no gardens here when the Lloyds arrived in 1910. There are many out-buildings on the property including several old barns. As buildings continue to be restored it is good to know that nothing is thrown away, but recycled to use on other projects. Old, thin, laminated tiles were used for the new roof on the loggia, that was previously the old chicken shed with rotted walls.
The Loggia Roof, Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
I think these buildings may be in future works…… or maybe not.
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
However, this might need an improvement……..it is the handicapped bathroom! Very primitive, but you get the feel for how things once were!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Most of the garden design was by Edwin Lutyens. The gardens are separated by yew hedges, which are sometimes curved, low brick walls, and many, many paths! The borders are mixed and in all colors. There is no segregating plants of differing habits, so you see shrubs, climbers, hardy and tender perennials, annuals and biennials, all growing together and contributing to the overall tapestry. There are nineteen different gardens here!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Some of the paving is of York sandstone. London’s pavements were ripped up and replaced by tarmac, and the stone became available for garden use. Lichens grow on it, making their own patterns, particularly noticeable at their ‘flowering’, in April. But the stone is slippery when wet!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
There is a large nursery here and many folks came to shop!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Nothing is wasted! Save the rainwater!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
One of the young gardeners showing us the grounds was a student from the U.S. She is participating in the USA Christopher Lloyd Scholarship. The scholarship provides a gardener from the United States with a year-long, practical education in the traditional style of ornamental gardening as practiced at two of the world’s most respected gardens, Great Dixter in East Sussex, England, and Chanticleer near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.
The scholarship offers an American gardener a chance to develop practical skills and an understanding of the ‘sense of place’ needed to manage complex, innovative flower gardens such as those at Great Dixter and Chanticleer. It is hoped that the scholar, in turn, will inspire a future generation of North American gardeners, passing on knowledge and skills. The student spends 11 months, from September to July, living and working at Great Dixter, immersed in all aspects of the garden’s operations and also attends symposiums and visits gardens, plant trials and garden shows. The final month of the scholarship is spent working at Chanticleer. Wow how great is that?
A map of Great Dixter is Here! I hope you enjoyed our tour of Great Dixter! I certainly did. This is the last garden of the year on my English Garden Tour! I have enjoyed every one and hope you did too! Until next time in the garden!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
This is the oldest section of Great Dixter Manor and as you can see it tips to the left!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
All great manors have a fascinating story to tell and Great Dixter is no exception. Nathanial Lloyd, born in Manchester, made his fortune when he founded his own color printing firm in 1893. In 1905, he married Daisy Field and rented a manor home in Rye where Nathanial could play golf on the weekends. He became so successful in his business, that by 1909, he was able to retire and devoted himself to golf and his passion for shooting. Nathanial and Daisy began to look for an old house to buy and they purchased Dixter, (a manor completed by the end of the Middle Ages), and its immediate grounds and farm buildings in May, 1910, for six thousand pounds, and the manor was re-named Great Dixter.
Nathanial and Daisy Lloyd
Lloyd hired Sir Ernest George as his architect, but soon realized that the apprentice to George, Edwin Lutyens, was the man to complete his manor. Lutyens wanted to enlarge or adapt existing buildings by using local materials and build on existing traditions. He drew up plans which consisted of the mid-15th century original home and added additions to it, by bringing a yeoman’s house from Benenden. He then added another addition to the house in 1912. So the manor then consisted of three houses, beautifully connected together. Lutyens admired the work of Gertrude Jekyll, who had a reputation for complimenting the grounds of the manors to the garden, which was a new approach to the English Garden. The ideas of Jekyll led Lutyens to design an English Garden for Great Dixter. Lutyens went on designing and building to become “the greatest British architect of the twentieth (or of any other) century.”
Edwin Lutyens
This was the ” Yeoman’s House” moved from Benenden, seventeen miles away! I don’t think I could have had that big of imagination! How could the combining of the houses work? The Yeoman’s House was literally falling down!
The House Moved from Benenden
Nathaniel and Daisy Lloyd raised six children at Great Dixter where they all developed a lasting attachment to the house and a deep knowledge of the garden. One of the bathrooms still has the pencil marks on a wall, recording their increasing height year by year. Selwyn (1909-35), the eldest child, went into the family business, but died at a young age from TB; Oliver (1911-85), whose second Christian name Cromwell spoke of Daisy’s ancestral connections, became a medical doctor and academic; Patrick (1913-56) was a professional soldier and died on active service in the Middle East; Quentin (1916-95) served as the estate manager for Great Dixter for many years; Letitia (1919-74) trained as a nurse; Christopher (1921-2006), the youngest child, was born in the north bedroom of the Lutyens wing and for the rest of his life Dixter was his home.
The Lloyd Childen
With the renovations and extension complete by 1912, Great Dixter was a large and comfortable family home. Central heating and electric lighting were installed from the onset and there was a domestic staff of five or more, including a chauffeur, a cook, two housemaids and a nursery maid. Outside staff included nine gardeners. For four years during the First World War, part of the house became a hospital and a total of 380 wounded soldiers passed through the temporary wards created in the Great Hall. In the Second War, Dixter housed evacuee boys from September 1939 until it was decided that they should go further west and away from the path of enemy aircraft.
After Nathaniel’s death in 1933, Daisy was in control until her death in 1972. Her contribution to the garden was most evident in the wild flower meadows, but her passion for all things plant related was as extensive as it was infectious. She was a determinedly energetic lady, an accomplished cook and brilliant embroiderer, who, having taken to wearing Austrian peasant costume, became an eccentric figure on the local scene. Christopher Lloyd, exceptional gardener and writer of gardening books, was the last Lloyd to occupy the manor and it was left to a charitable trust upon his death in 2006.
Christopher Lloyd
Part of the manor is open, but no photography is allowed inside!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
But we did manage a photo of the garden from the window!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
We took many photos of the gardens around various out buildings such as the oasts, which were restored in 2012.
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
This was one of the meadows. I just couldn’t get wrapped up in it though. I didn’t like the formal topiaries mixed in with the meadow. I would have preferred all lawn around these, but they didn’t ask me.
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
I think they were undecided too!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Flowers, flowers everywhere!
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
The Loggia…….with more flowers and plants……
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
Great Dixter, Sussex, UK
I hope you enjoyed the history of Great Dixter! There is a lot to explore here, so we’ll meet up with you again tomorrow! Enjoy!
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Here are the final photos I’ll show from Pashley Gardens. Truly, if I had one garden that I liked the best above all others I have seen in the last two years, it would be this one. The setting among the rolling hills and ponds was breathtakingly quiet. The garden was immaculate with all flowers and plants labeled. The gardeners could answer all my questions. The restaurant was very good and the view of the lawn and the pond was perfect for relaxing. The gift house had interesting gifts that I did not see at any other garden. The sculpture in the garden made you feel you were in a fine outdoor art museum. If I lived near I would have bought all the plants available from Pashley Manor and planted them in my garden. I would be proud to grow “London Pride.” I would attend the Tulip Festival, Rose Week, the Dahlia Delight, and at Christmas would shop with the fragrance of mulled wine wafting over me as I bought the orange and cinnamon candles and mince pies! I would be there so often they would know me by name! If you love visiting gardens add this one to your list by all means!
The Vegetable Patch at Pashley Manor and Gardens
The Vegetable Patch at Pashley Manor and Gardens
Here we are in the Vegetable Patch with the chickens and the rabbits……
The Chickens at Pashley Manor and Gardens
The Rabbits at Pashley Manor and Gardens
And green leafy plants…….
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Now to go to the pool area………
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
A good way to read a book……
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Next the green house………
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
My Favorite piece by Helen Sinclair……….The Waif.
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
A peek through the gate………
Pashley Manor and Gardens
Pashley Manor and Gardens
to see the Bowsers that guard……..and the twirl of her skirts…..
Pashley Manor and Gardens
And a close up to show the Manor is actually pale pink!
Pashley Manor and Gardens
The plant area with a small chapel where the gift shop is……..I’ll collect my goodies…..
The Gift Area at Pashley Manor Gardens, Ticehurst, UK
And say goodbye!
Pashley Manor and Gardens
I hope to visit again soon! See you in the garden!
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