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We are grateful to: Anne Gatti for writing the text. Photographers for the use of their images: John Glover Derek St Romaine Sue Bishop Karen Webster Jim Holden Nick Barrie Borde Hill Garden Haywards Heath West Sussex RH16 1XP www.bordehill.co.uk Registered Charity: 246589
SOUVENIR GUIDE
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Above: Andrewjohn & Eleni Stephenson Clarke
“Welcome
“One of the country’s truly great gardens” Country Life
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to this renowned garden set in a landscape with stunning views, whose peaceful surroundings compliment the garden plantings that can enthral the most ardent plantsman or entice the most inquisitive child. Created by my great grandfather as a series of garden rooms, the wealth and diversity of plants and trees present at Borde Hill today make it a rare and special place to visit. We do hope you enjoy exploring our wonderful home.” Andrewjohn Stephenson Clarke 1
“A historic garden of this diversity and importance needs to be carefully nurtured. I am delighted that my wife and family take a keen interest in protecting the natural beauty and peace for the generations to come.”
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History
restored the Garden and woodlands after the inevitable decline of the war years. He set up the Garden as a charity in 1965, governed by a council including members from the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew & Edinburgh, Royal Horticultural Society and Cambridge Botanical Garden.
The Stephenson Clarke family Originally from Northumberland, the Clarke family started in shipping when in the late 17th century John Clarke owned the dock at North Shields. In 1730 brothers Ralph and Robert started a fleet of colliers, and in 1776 John Clarke (encouraged by his wife Jane Stephenson) expanded the business to London. As coal factors the Stephenson Clarke fleet was the oldest family shipping line in the country (having owned around 280 ships over 280 years), and the family ran the largest private fleet of coal trucks on the railway before nationalisation. The family moved to Tooting in South London, and then in the 1840’s settled in Sussex. I am the fourth generation of the Stephenson Clarke family to live within the beautiful surroundings of Borde Hill, a privilege that I owe to my great-grandfather, Colonel Stephenson R. Clarke, who purchased the Borde Hill property in 1893 when it had only a simple garden with a few good trees and the usual shrubberies. He was a keen naturalist, who, in the opinion of the great plantsman, Harold Hillier, was the “greatest amateur all rounder in the gardening world during the 1900s”. Colonel Stephenson R. Clarke enthusiastically extended the plantings from the garden to the woodlands and parkland. In 1948 my grandfather, Colonel Sir Ralph Clarke, took over and
My father, Robert N. Stephenson Clarke, took over the Garden in 1970 and soon developed a great interest in rhododendrons, becoming one of the top experts in the field. He was assisted by head gardener Jack Vass, who was still working when I moved to Borde Hill in 1988. Sadly my father died only weeks after the1987 storm and the lake, ‘Robertsmere’, was was built in his memory. My wife Eleni, a Greek Cypriot from Paphos, has an honours degree in Geology and takes a keen interest in the Garden. She was the initiator of Jay Robin’s Rose Garden (named after our daughter) and is a keen photographer. Together we continue the family tradition of developing the planting interest by engaging well known and innovative garden designers to add and extend the colour and variety of the garden ‘rooms’. Andrewjohn Stephenson Clarke
Top: RHS Veitch memorial medal. Above: Col. Stephenson R. Clarke (SRC). Opposite: SRC and family
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Borde Hill House This impressive Elizabethan Mansion House was built in 1598 by Stephen Borde, a physician, whose grandfather Andrew Borde was physician to the King and an author in the courts of Henry VIII and Edward VI. The west end of the House has the original 1598 porch and striking internal decorations from 1601. In 1703 the Borde family moved to their larger property, Paxhill Park, and sold Borde Hill House with the estate to Walter Gatland (of Nymans) and he again sold it in1803. Over the centuries the House has maintained it’s original style despite being extended in the early 18th century by Gatland, then again after he sold, and finally by the Stephenson Clarke’s.
Above: Family portraits in the Dining Room at Borde Hill House. Right: Borde Hill House as depicted in the 1870 sale catalogue and showing the Ouse Valley Viaduct in the background. Note the single storey extension added to the Borde’s original house.
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The Garden Borde Hill, a historic garden with a magnificent plant collection, is a place of tranquillity and beauty, offering the visitor a succession of glorious sights and scents from early spring to late autumn. Situated within 200 acres of parkland and woodland in the High Weald of Sussex, in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, the Garden extends on either side of the handsome Elizabethan mansion house along a narrow ridge which runs eastwards from Cuckfield. To the north, the ground slopes gradually to the floor of the upper Ouse Valley where a monumental brick viaduct carries the main London to Brighton railway line high above the valley floor. To the south is an expanse of open parkland with two large lakes and plantings of mixed woodland and scatterings of mature specimen trees. There is much to explore at Borde Hill. Its trees and shrubs, many of them champion specimens and others rare in Britain, make it a dendrologist’s paradise. For others, the pleasure will be the discovery of a series of discrete and horticulturally different garden rooms set within the l7 acres of formal garden, some created in hollows where once stone was quarried, others in the shelter of disused potting sheds and glasshouses. For families there are the wide open spaces of the parkland where children can run free and picnics can be enjoyed. There are peaceful walks through the woods and educational trails, and no matter which direction the visitor takes, there are outstanding views across the High Weald. Much of what the visitor experiences today is thanks to Colonel Stephenson R. Clarke, who had the vision and energy to improve the landscape he bought in 1893 by planting new areas and enriching the existing woodlands with exotic and unusual trees, many of them collected by the great plant hunters of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Above: View from the west end of the House. Right: Aerial view showing Borde Hill House and Jay Robin’s Rose Garden.
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Old Rhododendron Garden At the entrance to the Garden leading into the Old Rhododendron Garden is a large Magnolia sprengeri var. diva. To the left, the grassy Jack Vass Walk (head gardener 1968-1979) is flanked by deep plantings of rhododendrons. These are mostly hybrids of Himalayan species such as Rh.arboreum, Rh. griffithianum, Rh. thomsonii, Rh. barbatum and Rh. fortunei, and are some of the first Chinese rhododendrons to be introduced to Britain by the great plant collectors of the 19th century. On the left look out for the fine Hoheria angustifolia ‘Borde Hill’, a slender tree with serrated leaves from New Zealand with masses of small white flowers in summer. Return to the main path and approach the Rose Garden past three Davidia involucrata. Ahead sprawls a Magnolia dawsoniana, its multi-stemmed branches form the regrowth after the original tree fell. Behind it is a fine, tall Magnolia sargentiana var. robusta, which produces large, goblet-shaped pink flowers. Introduced from western China by Ernest Wilson it first bloomed in 1939 when 25 feet tall. Seeds were propagated at Chenault’s Nursery in France and our specimen came from there, after 1918.
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Jay Robin’s Rose Garden Named after Andrewjohn and Eleni Stephenson Clarke’s daughter, this area was designed by RHS gold medallist Robin Williams in 1996. It is planted with a profusion of fragrant David Austin Old English roses, with some additional shrub roses such as the long-flowering red cultivar R. ‘Home Run’, set in a geometric framework of low box hedging and Lavender ‘Loddon Blue’. The colour scheme changes from whites and yellows to pinks, oranges and reds, returning to pinks in the final bed. Height is provided by small trees such as Prunus serrula and Malus sargentii. The garden is framed on two sides by topiary and yew hedges. In the centre is a brick edged pool encircled with bands of nepeta. A Rosa ‘Sanders White’ covers the timber archway to the North, with rope swags on either side planted with a selection of pink and red rambling roses. Many of Borde Hill’s plants owe their introduction to Frank Kingdon-Ward and a delightful pink rose, bred in India from Rosa gigantea and named after the plant hunter, was planted in 2016 against the brick wall beside the Yew topiary.
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Mediterranean Garden This sunny courtyard was designed by Robin Williams on the site of a Victorian greenhouse that housed orange trees and South American plants. Its walls now shelter a collection of sun-loving and drought resistant plants such as Cytisus battandieri,Vitis ‘Brant’, Trachycarpus fortunei and Eriobotrya japonica. Ahead is the area where many of the 27 gardeners employed in the garden in the 1930’s spent much of their working days, tending to ornamentals and fruit trees and propagating in the Victorian greenhouses. Some of the greenhouses have been replaced by aluminium-framed ones and others have been fully restored, with their original cast iron winding gear, floor grates and pipe-work still intact. To the right is the brick frame of the Melon House which is now filled with pink and pastel shades of Gold Standard Roses - varieties that have been awarded this title after excelling at trials which assess their health, floriferousness, scent and commercial appeal - given to Borde Hill by the British Association of Rose Breeders in 2010. Opposite is the Peach House used for plant displays and historical information. Follow the tarmac path through a vine-covered metal arch along the eastern side of the Rose Garden and turn right, on the brick path, along its southern side. On the left, a line of metal obelisks mark the box-edged herbaceous border, filled with a selection of blue and white plants, including delphiniums, campanula and asters, at the edge of the Shady Garden. Here a Maakia amurensis, a rare tree of northern China, is underplanted with Liriope muscari and creates seasonal interest from its silver blue spring foliage and panicles of white flowers in summer.
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Mid Summer Border and South Lawn Continue up the brick path to the intimate White Garden filled with white-bloomed perennials and shrubs and round to the grassy glade where the garden tea room provides refreshments. Turn right on to the tarmac path and walk south past a majestic oak. At the south-east corner of South Lawn is the Mid Summer Border, which introduces vibrant colours from perennials, grasses and shrubs in summer and autumn. Planted in 2011 to a design by Dr Tony Lord it incorporates various Gold Standard Roses in shades of orange, red and yellow mixed with green, gold and burnished grasses such as Calamagrostis brachytricha and Miscanthus sinensis ’Gracillimus’ and crocosmia and hemerocallis. To the left as the path meets the perimeter route is the Autumn Border which provides a tapestry of autumnal plums, reds, oranges and purples from a selection of shrubs and perennials including Cotinus ‘Grace and ‘Royal Purple’, Euonymus europaeus ‘Red Cascade’, Acer palmatum ’Osakazuki’ and Callicarpa japonica.
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The West Bank To the West of the South Lawn, beyond the ancient oak and group of Taxodium distichum, the land rises up a bank that is home to plants which get the morning sun and add colour to brighten the spirits. The plantings on and around the West Bank are designed to provide late summer and autumn colour. Herbaceous plantings of Helenium, Rudbeckia, Sedums and Asters complement fiery autumn colours from acers including Acer palmatum ‘Osakazuki’ and Acer palmatum dissectum growing on and below the bank. At the top of the West Bank the large pines and a Cryptomeria japonica, grown from seed collected by SRC’s brother in Japan in 1890, survived the 1987 storm. Running through the pines is a short walkway, leading to the Italian Garden, containing a selection of camellias and a fine Acer palmatum ‘Elegans’. The path also offers a fine view of the acers growing along the bottom of the bank. Above: Catalpa fargesii f. duclouxii. Right: Acers viewed from the top of West Bank.
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Paradise Walk The ha-ha, built by SRC in the 1890s, levels the lawn to enhance the view from the house. It runs from the gate at the end of the Autumn Border to Paradise Walk and forms the boundary of the South Lawn. From the path alongside the ha-ha look right for a clear view of the house which has a large Magnolia grandiflora ‘Goliath’ against the southern facade. On a knoll to the left of the house a fine collection of trees and shrubs, including rhododendrons and azaleas, an Acer pseudoplatanus ‘Brilliantissimum’ and a Liquidambar styraciflua create a focal point in spring and autumn. Behind you is the gentle landscape of South Park, with two lakes and woodland copses. Ahead the land slopes up to another group of discrete gardens leading off Paradise Walk. The borders that frame this delightful walkway, which were re-planted to a new design by James Alexander-Sinclair in 2013, creates a rolling tapestry of colourful herbaceous perennials from summer to late autumn. The wider southern border is punctuated by a mature Acer palmatum ‘Dissectum Atropurpureum’. Repetitions of Geranium ‘Rozanne’ and Perovskia ‘Blue Spire’ create blue accents down both sides while Sanguisorba officinalis ‘Arnhem’, Kniphofia uvaria ‘Nobilis’ , Kniphofia ‘Tawny King’ and Aster novae-angliae ‘Alma Potschke’ add stature and bursts of strong colour. On the right, stone steps lead up to lower and upper terraces of the Italian Garden and a little further along the path is the entrance to the Round Dell.
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Italian Garden Originally this was the family's hard tennis court but in 1980 it was converted by Robert Stephenson Clarke to be the ‘Bride’s Pool’ named after a nearby statue that is now in the main house. Before the 1987 hurricane the Northen and Western edges were planted with numerous mature pine trees, that mirrored the few now remaining. This formal pool has a striking kinetic water sculpture, ‘Aquapoise’, by Angela Conner. Large terracotta pots frame the water while the stone terrace is delineated with clipped box parterre beds infilled with spheres of Pittosporum ‘Tom Thumb’, diagonal bands of variegated Buxus latifolia maculata, and conical Pittosporum tenuifolium plants. A stone rill bisects the steps to the upper terrace where clipped Myrtus communis ssp. tarentina frames the parterre beds, each one planted with a single elegant standard Magnolia grandiflora ‘Kay Parris’. The view from the upper terrace across the reflective water of the pool and the to parkland beyond is framed by Discaria chacaye, one of Borde Hill’s champion trees.
Right: Italian Pool on an early summer’s morning.
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Round Dell This secret sunken garden, on the site of a former quarry, where sub-tropical plants have flourished in the sheltered micro-climate for many years, has been re-imagined as, in the words of garden designer Sophie Walker, ‘an immersive place that opens up secrets, slowly and sequentially through the process of a journey’. The contemporary design, which is being installed during 2017, creates a bold entrance into the dell along a needle-shaped concrete path that, like the prow of a ship, steers a course through the heart of the foliage-rich planting. A series of narrower paths offer winding routes between beds created around existing plantings of large-leaved species such as Aralia elata, Musa basjoo, and Tetrapanax papyrifer. Look out for several exciting new specimens found by modern day plant hunters, including varieties of Schefflera, and unusual evergreens such as Daphniphyllum macropodum.
Above: Artist's impression of the new design by Sophie Walker.
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Old Potting Sheds Go through the ornate gates at the end of Paradise Walk round to the Old Potting Sheds whose brick walls, some with leaded windows still intact, create a romantic setting for plants from different parts of the world. These sheds were originally part of the small-holding attached to West Garden Lodge and are shown on a map dated 1870. Up until 1990 the area was used as a herb garden. Now, the walls provide the shelter required for Southern Hemisphere species. In the main room, look out for Amicia zygomeris, a Mexican shrub with finely etched leaves and canary-yellow pea-like flowers in autumn, and the red-flowered Lobelia tupa from Chile. In the smaller rooms New Zealand species include evergreen Sophora microphylla ‘Sun King’ and the fineleaved native conifer Dacrycarpus dacrydioides. Other plants include Indigofera amblyantha and Lagerstroemia indica.
Above: Chaenomeles (quince) by the Old Potting Sheds wall.
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Long Dell The path continues towards the Long Dell which offers the unusual sensation of looking down on the canopies of trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants from the SinoHimalayan region, including Trachycarpus fortunei and Magnolia delaveyi, planted on the slopes and bottom of a former stone quarry. Follow the path down to explore the huge galvanized metal cube, the ‘Infinity Box’ installation and peer through the portholes to experience, through the interplay of its mirrored walls, the magical sense of the planting extending to infinity.
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Garden of Allah This informally planted dell below the house, created in 1925, was where SRC nurtured many of the species brought back by the great plant hunters. Subsequently Sir Ralph, who inherited the estate in 1948, responded to the sheltered and tranquil nature of this hidden dell by naming it the Garden of Allah. To the right, stands a magnificent specimen of Liriodendron chinense which was raised from seed collected by Ernest Wilson in Central China and bought from Veitch’s nursery in Chelsea, in 1913. A letter to SRC from Wilson in July 1927 (who was at the time at the Arnold Arboretum in Boston) shows that it was in flower fourteen years later. Further on are three magnificent magnolias. To the left is a Magnolia obovata with large leaves and very fragrant flowers and to the right is a fine specimen of Magnolia fraseri which was received as a seedling from the south-eastern USA in 1933, and a Magnolia officinalis from China, a gift from Col. Messel of Nymans. The path then winds through plantings of rhododendrons and camellias. These were established in the mid 1920’s with plants that had been grown from seed collected by Frank Kingdon-Ward in North Burma and by George Forrest who collected in South-West Yunnan. A more unusual one is the Magnolia ‘Black Tulip’ shown here to the left. Leaving the garden, the path continues below the house and at this point offers spectacular views across the Ouse Valley to the viaduct.
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Warren Wood In the Garden of Allah, next to Becky’s Bower, a grassy track leads down into Warren Wood and beyond it to Stephanie’s Glade. This part of the garden offers peaceful walks through native and exotic trees and should definitely not be missed in May and June when the tree-sized rhododendrons are in full bloom, and the woodland floor is carpeted with bluebells and wood anemones. Recent plantings of hardy hybrid rhododendrons on either side of the grass slope draw the eye to the fascinating collection of trees and shrubs within the mixed woods ahead. From 1905 more than 200 exotic species were added to the existing oak, ash and hazel mix, some of which were cleared to make room for these new introductions. It is here, in the shelter provided by the established trees and sustained by humus-rich soil, that many of Borde Hill’s champion trees and mature rhododendrons are found. Before you enter the wood on your left stands a large Platanus orientalis var. insularis that was collected as seed by Sir Ralph, at Mudros on the Greek island of Lemnos in 1916. Opposite are a number of fragrant rhododendron hybrids of Rh. fortunei. Behind these plants a small path takes you past a Davidia involucrata (left) shooting from its stump after falling in 1987, a fine Chamaecyparis formosensis collected by Henry Elwes in Taiwan in 1912, and an impressive Podocarpus salignus. Upstream from the small bridge, on your right, is Phellodendron amurense var. lavallei, a deciduous Chinese tree with corky bark and leaves that turn yellow in autumn. The path continues through groups of large Berberis. Look out for the young Wollemi Pine (Wollemia nobilis) on your right.
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Azalea Ring A horseshoe-shaped planting of deciduous azaleas which dazzle in shades of yellow, orange, red, pink, white and cream in late May. On the North side of the Ring there is the Camellia Ring. This springtime bower of blossoms include the rose-pink C. x williamsii ‘Donation’, raised by SRC by crossing C. japonica ‘Donckelarii’ and C. saluenensis. It received the RHS Award of Merit in 1941 and is probably the most floriforous and best selling camellia worldwide. Most of these deciduous azaleas were chosen by SRC in the early 1900’s from the Knap Hill strain. Magnolias in these beds include a fine M. campbellii which flowers in March and an old specimen of M. x soulangeana ‘Brozzonii’ a late flowering cultivar, planted in 1908, with gobletshaped white flowers. A horticultural jewel of this part of the garden is a deciduous Chinese tree, Emmenopterys henryi, with fragrant creamy-white flowers. Now endangered in the wild, it was first introduced to England in 1907 by Ernest Wilson who described it as ‘one of the most strikingly beautiful trees of Chinese forests’. One was planted by the entrance to the Camellia Ring, and the older specimen collected by Forrest, standing at the Southern end of the Ring bloomed in 2011- 83 years after it was planted!
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Parkland To the South of the Garden is the South Park, with its rolling parkland and small woodlands with space for families, and dog walkers, to stretch their legs and explore. The larger fishing lake is called Robertsmere, in memory of Robert Stephenson Clarke, and the smaller is called Harry’s Lake after his grandson. Stone Pits wood, named after the sandstone quarry in its centre, is also known as Spring Copse because of the marshy area which features a collection of Alders. The top of the wood is drier and sunnier, and home to oaks, rhododendrons and magnolias, and in the park are Acers and Pterocaryas, including the unusual Pterocarya x rehderiana a natural hybrid of P. fraxinifolia and P. stenoptera.
Families at Borde Hill Borde Hill offers a programme of children’s activities that range from trails at Easter, Summer and Halloween to entertainers on selected days with activities such as face painting, reptiles, or organised fun. Our webite gives details as the programme varies each year. As well as organised events, families and children can enjoy our Playground, or simply explore the garden and parkland, and of course be visitors to our sculpture display, car shows etc. during the year.
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“Fun for all the family” 40