Hestercombe refuses to stand still as restored water mill opens
There are some large restored gardens that seem to stand still, as if everything has been done. That’s not true of Hestercombe.
With the restoration of the spectacular Edwardian garden designed by Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll some years ago, and the more recent programme restoring the 18th century landscape garden in the combe behind the house, it would seem that the work was complete at the garden in the countryside near Taunton.
Not a bit of it. The 17th century watermill is now added to the list, as a £1.6 million restoration has been achieved with the aid of grants, the largest from the Heritage Lottery Fund, and completed in just over a year.
Visitors can now go to see the old water wheel working as it did when it operated as the estate timber mill, and a range of machinery used to generate energy to the house and estate in the past.
It is one of the last pieces of the jigsaw to be put back in place, a vital part of the dream of its director, Philip White, to make the gardens one whole entity again.
Local people have contributed at least £30,000 to the restoration by buying a brick for £100 a time. When the Mill and the adjacent Barn were awarded the £800,000 grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund in 2007, a condition was that it would be matched by Hestercombe itself.
So the ‘Be a brick, Buy a Brick’ campaign was launched, with donors having their commemorative brick engraved with their names and permanently displayed on a Contributors’ Wall at the entrance to the Mill. The appeal is ongoing.
But one of the main attractions in the newly restored area is in the tunnel Lutyens designed under the Dutch garden to store gardening equipment. Now it is a viewing gallery showing a fascinating film of recently discovered and never before seen Edwardian photographs documenting Hestercombe in its heyday.
The film, ‘The Edwardian Era at Hestercombe’, has been made by journalist Rebecca Pow from a family archive of old photographs of the Portman family who owned the estate from 1872 until 1944.
Steps up to Hestercombe’s Dutch garden
The photographs were taken by a great-uncle of Viscount de Vesci, great-grandson of Mrs Portman
The Mill pond and the restoration area
who lived at Hestercombe until her death in 1951 at the age of 96. They are a remarkable insight into the life of a wealthy Edwardian family.
There was the team of
carpenters, and of gardeners, the gamekeeper and the shepherd, the butler and the cook, the dashing looking chauffeur, the men taking a break in the fields, and the Hestercombe cricket team.
We can now see something of the Portmans’ model farm with their beloved Devon Red cattle, the magnificent range of glasshouses in the kitchen garden, and the impact on the estate of the Hon E. ‘Teddy’ Portman’s death aged 55 in 1911.
Every year there’s something new to see at Hestercombe. Last year the Turkish Tent was set up high above the combe as it would have been in the 18th century when picnics were arranged there. It is put up in late spring and is taken down in the autumn, just as happened so long ago.
It is often said that Hestercombe is three gardens in one: the Edwardian garden with its Great Plat, long pergola and beautiful Orangery (the only garden building designed by Lutyens), the Victorian Terrace overlooking the Great Plat, and the 18th century garden in the combe created by Coplestone Warre Bampfylde, influenced by the garden at Stourhead made by his friend Henry Hoare.
You can find the replica of the Friendship Urn near the Turkish Tent. It commemorates Bampfylde’s friendship with Hoare, of the banking family, and Henry Tynte, who lived at nearby Halswell, also restored in recent years.
But it was the Portmans’ legacy that makes the garden great, with the grand Edwardian garden probably the finest of its period in the country today.
Location: Hestercombe, Cheddon Fitzpaine, near Taunton, Somerset TA2 8LG. 5 miles from Junction 25 off the M5, and 2.5. miles from Taunton. Signposted from all main roads in the area with the brown tourist information ‘daisy’ symbol.
Open: Daily (except Christmas Day) 10am – 6pm
Admission: £8.90 adults, Seniors £8.30, £3.30 children (under 5’s free) and other categories. Free entry to restaurant & coffee shop, Lutyens Gallery, shop & plant centre.
Telephone: 01823 413923 Website:
www.hestercombe.com
Country Gardener 39
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56