Garden Visiting In July - Part One

Temple Newsam is a place we visit often. I grew up within walking distance and we now live just a ten minute car journey away. I've wrote about it many times on my Through The Keyhole blog, a couple of the posts are Temple Newsam and Temple Newsam Rhododendron Walk.

On this occasion, our trip to Temple Newsam was to visit the walled garden for my garden visit for July.

The walled gardens were set up on this site in 1788 and were used for the cultivation of vegetables, fruit and cut flowers for the house. The gardens became famous for the cultivation of pineapples, the gardeners produced Queen pineapples weighing five or six pounds each. By the mid nineteenth century other varieties such as White Providence, Montserrat and Prince Albert were also being propagated.

The walled garden now presents an extensive rose garden originating from about 1923.

Around the walls are magnificent herbaceous borders, some of which are 800 yards in length.

The borders are quite deep and have some glorious height to them.

Such bold splashes of colour.

As you enter the walled garden, you can see the 'lean-to' conservatory which contains a host of temperate plants.

There's a fabulous potting area in the doorway of the conservatory with different bays set aside for the different composts used. How I'd love an area like this to do my own potting.

The first area you come to inside the conservatory is filled with zonal pelargoniums, such a fabulous display. They're trained to cover the full height of the wall, some 10 - 12 feet.

There are also upright fuchsias here, I've never seen fuchsias with such thick stems, but they're grown so that they flower above head height and are a brilliant feature.

The next area you come across is filled with coleus, so many different varieties.

I love the contrasts between the zinging lime green varieties and the darker leafed specimens.

Next, we come to an area which houses plants from Central and South America. These are abutilons, a plant I'm not familiar with but part of the mallow family. I love the effect against the whitewashed walls.

This ipomoea is such a gorgeous colour, it really zings.

Bougainvillea Barbara Karst.

As we exit the conservatory, we're back again in the rose garden. It looks fabulous from this elevated position with the park land behind the walls.

The gardens are also home to five of the eleven national collections held by Leeds City Council, including delphinium, phlox, aster, chrysanthemum and solenostemon.

We're so lucky to have such a beautiful place on our doorstep. Pop back for Part Two and I'll show you some more.