34 New Stour & Avon, January 14, 2022
Home & Garden
Those colourful signs of new beginnings by Lorraine Gibson Lacy estate today. newsdesk@stour andavon.net
In Japanese culture the cherry blossom is highly prized for its delicate and ethereal beauty. To them, it represents both new beginnings and the fragility of life. Not only beautiful on the trees, the blossom creates a magical effect as it falls like snow to form a soft petal carpet on the ground. And on the subject of new beginnings, an innovative new venture called the Sakura Cherry Tree Project, designed to celebrate the friendship between Britain and Japan, has given a hundred cherry trees to Kingston Lacy, allowing them to enhance a garden originally imagined by the famous house’s owner, Henrietta Bankes, more than a century ago. Henrietta developed such a fascination with Japanese gardens that she was inspired to create the much-loved Tea Garden that still enchants visitors in the grounds of the Kingston
After it was restored to its former zen glory by the National Trust in 2005 it features a rich diversity of plants native to Japan, from bamboo and acers to maples and cherries. The 100 new trees were planted opposite the Tea Garden last February meaning that this peaceful and tranquil area will also offer a magnificent display of delicate blossom every spring for generations to come. “Every year I look forward to the cherry blossom appearing as it means that spring has well and truly arrived,” says head gardener, Andrew Hunt. “Visitors at this time of year will see the pink blossom of the varieties Pandora and Shogestsu and the creamy white Ukon. “Perhaps the most impressive tree in the collection is the TaiHaku (great white cherry),” he adds, “this is a vast tree and its white blossom is spectacular.” Visit japansakura.org.
Tiny green shoots of snowdrops, those wonderful proclaimers of spring approaching, are already tentatively peeping through the damp leaves and moss in Kingston Lacy’s Victorian fernery. It all starts there, in the quiet, shady corner just beyond the house but soon carpets of brilliant white will be everywhere, as the famous ‘snowdrop walk’ meanders through the 40acre garden for a mile and a half. The fernery makes an atmospheric starting place before heading down the Lime Avenue and on to Lady’s Walk, where Henrietta Bankes planted the first snowdrops in the early 1900s.
