You know those days when one thing tips the whole day into chaos? I suppose it is inevitable really: a cross between Rabbie Burns(i) and the Butterfly flapping its pesky wings above the forests of Brazil.
I spend quite a lot of time driving. More time, even ,than I spend on trains. Last Friday was a marathon and I still feel a little wan. I began by driving from here (Northamptonshire) to Worcestershire where I needed to chivvy some electricians and organise some sturdy fellows who were planting some large trees and a hefty hedge. From there a reasonably short hop to Warwickshire to talk about more trees (and roses, fences, lakes, wildflowers,bulbs and hedges). From there to Suffolk for more chatting and arm waving before returning home in time for slumping.
All went well until about 8:30 in the morning when I found out that the tree chaps would not turn up until 10am. I went to buy a broom in Evesham to fill the time but after that my schedule was completely shot – before it had even begun. Hey-Ho. Apart from the client meetings (which were all very satisfactory, thank you very much for asking) the following interesting things happened…….
Nothing.Rien.Nada.
This is unfortunate for a blog that feeds off trivial happenings (ii). In this case an entire day when the most interesting thing was a short shower of rain and stopping for a pee at a large Tescos just off the A14.
So, it was fortunate then that I was due to do some light garden visiting this week so I do not have to invent something dubious about which to write. I was invited by the garden world’s equivalent of teen sensation Olly Murs: Mr Christopher Young the ed of The Garden to accompany him on a visit to Boughton House which, conveniently, lies equidistant between our houses. For those who do not know, it is a whopping great pile owned by the Dukes of Buccleuch since the sixteenth century (although, of course, they were not Dukes at that stage of proceedings: those of you who wish to research their genealogy may peel off at this stage and go here. The rest of you, follow me…)
The landscape at Boughton is all about trees and views and water: originally there were lots of parterres and paths and formal ponds but over the years they have vanished. There are long rides that disappear off towards distant churches and a remarkable system of canals. These are a series of perfect rectangular waterways dug in the Eighteenth Century in order to divert the river into something rectilinear and formal. They had become a bit choked over the years so in 2006 a programme of restoration was begun: silt was removed, weirs and sluices repaired and the banks lined with oak. They are extraordinarily lovely and slice through the landscape with the litheness and elegance of a bonefish (except,obviously, a bit slower).
At the same time the Mount was cleared of trees (except a fabulous Cedar that is where the herons nest) and resculpted. Many of you will be aware that the very clever Kim Wilkie has been doing stuff at Boughton, in particular an enormous hole called Orpheus. This is a peculiarly lovely piece of work that in size and shape perfectly matches the mount: in negative. Orpheus descends, the mount rises.
Badda-bing,Badda-boom.
Perfect, Impressive, Majestic and Splendid. It is the sort of thing that makes one sigh from the pleasure of it all. And I did..
But…
As well as this arpeggio of austerity there is a further construction: just beside Orpheus is a stainless steel cubic framework and an illustration in stone and water of the Golden Section. The idea is to show the science of proportion and all that jazz. I think it is an unnecessary conceit that ruins the clarity of the earth works. It is like a magician who, after performing a perfect illusion then proceeds to whip out a whiteboard and explain how very clever it all is. It removes the mystery of the landscape and should not be there. By all means show your workings, if you must, draw a map if you have to but do it somewhere else, not in the middle of one of the finest vistas in the country.
Please.
Apparently it is there in order to stimulate debate, if that is the case it has served its purpose. I contend that it should be elsewhere: that is my contribution to the debate. Go and see it to decide for yourselves, you will not be disappointed.
The picture is of some Iris reticulata behaving as if they were Meryl Streep at Lyme Regis in the French Lieutenant’s Woman
I am listening to Hey,That’s No way To say Goodbye by Leonard Cohen.
(i) But Mousie, thou art no thy lane, In proving foresight may be vain: The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men Gang aft agley, An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain, For promis’d joy!
(ii) One of my many Spammy friends has sent me an email offering to “shop online for a pen enlargement patch”. This was an offer I could not refuse and my humble Bic is now a whopping great Jumbo Indelible Marker.
Dear James. I hate to think of you doing all that driving. Would you like a chauffeur? I can start on Monday – Lucy won’t mind – we’ll have a ball x x x
I can think of nothing better than having you driving me around. You would have to wear a cap though.
You are the king of similes and metaphors, I know, but the Iris reticulata as Meryl Streep on the Cobb has to be your best so far. Fabulous. Is this fanmail?
Thank you. It is close to Fanmail but I am sure that, given a bit of time, you could do better on the full blown flattery.
Dear James, I’m with you about the steel frame – although a couple of car tyres swinging from some lengths of chain might help things.
PS – I can start on Sunday – and I’ll bring biscuits.
And have a splendid hol.
There is a swing, quite close by: but as it was tied up for the winter I mistook it for a very complicated bit of tree staking equipment.
James, I love you!!!! You are so right – that silly construction is out of scale, pea on a drum stuff. Dreadful. Irritating. Debating point, rubbish: takes edge off the hole.
The ornamental garden near the house is pretty ghastly too in it’s ‘season’.
When we went the hole was roped off. I asked some other visitors if they minded. They said they lived locally so ‘we’ll be able to have a go another time’. Loved response to the hole as if it were a fairground ride.
Journalists poured in on the original press day to admire it all. Not one raised a dissenting voice. You make me feel sane. Sometimes.
XXXXXXXX
Gosh.
What else can I say?
It is, as I said, annoying and unnecessary. Apparently it looks quite nice when the steel catches the setting sun.
Sometimes.
Dear James
i saw this and thought of your post
http://unhappyhipsters.com/
A
Wow, the Orpheus is quite spectacular and in some ways reminds me of images of Machu Picchu, somewhere I have always wanted to visit. That other bit looks more like a sports playing field, which is somewhere I never want to visit again!
Hullo, FairyFluffCakes
What a fine name you have: a thousand welcomes to Blackpitts.
It is quite Zigguratish and has an air of something prehistoric about it.
To latch on to perhaps the least significant part of your post – I despise the A14 as a road, having had to schlep up and down it for several years, usually the bit between Cambridge and the M1/M6 end. It’s long, boring, and with one almost empty lane (apart from the occasional lorry), and one horrendously busy lane where everyone refuses to pull in to the empty lane after overtaking the occasional lorry. Grrr.
The cube does indeed look pointless.
Not at all insignificant. The A14 is appalling.
The two worst traffic jams in which I have ever been stuck were both on the A14. One of them was five hours long.
The shape reminds me of a spangle…I used to like spangles.
Forgive me but that is errant nonsense.
This is much more like a Mintola or Munchie.
A Spangle was a roundy square with a tongue shaped hollow in the middle. Partly to make it an all round taste and touch sensation (a process made even more important by the paper wrapping that came off as easily as the outer skin from a Tulip) and also so that Messrs.Spangle Ltd could use less sweet (see also Trebor Mint and, the master of the genre, the Polo mint: where we enthusiastically paid good money for less mint.)
Orpheus is a quite sublime piece of landscape art. How fab to have thought of it and have clients who will go ahead and do it. Not only is the cube all wrong in itself, it obscures the view I most want to see – the point where the mount and Orpheus are in line with one another with nothing in the way.
I just wish my pragmatic brain would stop imagining the mower slipping down into the hole, or the water flecked with grass clippings.
You are right, of course. There is another good vantage point from up by the house but that has a tree in the way.
It is also far enough away for the cube to be invisible. This is a good thing.
That cube thing is crap – someone needed to say it, I can’t drive (but I’m not a sycophant either), though I am wonderous company and even turn a blind eye to the cake pretending to be a biscuit.
Also that water feature is fab but how is one meant to cut the grass?? Designers, hump…..
There are very clever automatic mowing machines than scutter all over the slopes keeping them mown.
I was in Uruguay and just missed this. The Mount and Orpheus are sublime (that difficult word does seem appropriate here), but the steel frame and golden rectangle look like debris someone forgot to remove following construction. Too much thinking made visible.
We seem to have a consensus on the cube and the Golden Section thing.
Maybe we should organise a midnight raid armed with angle grinders and pneumatic breakers.
I hope Uruguay was delightful.
For what its worth – and I know you will think its a lot- I completely agree with you James. Spot on.