Midlands Explorer - Moseley Old Hall

I tried my best to avoid all things royal this past weekend - don't get me started on the subject - but what happens when you take yourself off to a 17th century Manor House near Wolverhampton, is that you end up tripping over them. 

In this case the encounter was with the future Charles II during his flight from defeat at the battle of Worcester in 1651. Having hidden in the famous oak tree, he was given shelter by the Catholic family here, even hiding in the priest hole between the house's upper and lower floors under the garde-robe when Parliamentarian forces came calling, before making his escape via a very circuitous route through England and across the Channel to France. Pity he came back.

On a small enough scale to imagine living in it, Moseley Old Hall is a delight of wooden interiors, including chapel in the attic disguised as a school room, pleasant parlours and bedrooms, and a lovely knot garden. Most impressive were the stump work embroideries of which there were many, along with the Royal and Parliamentary propaganda. 

Ham House

Precious little open, it is a lockdown after all, but you might be forgiven for thinking otherwise as all of west London is out and about walking the high streets of Chiswick and Richmond to buy take away coffee, promenade along the river, or look for deer in the park. Booking anywhere to walk, like Kew Gardens, takes the forethought I am seldom capable of, hence, there is no chance of going there on a weekend. Instead we opted for a stroll around the gardens at Ham House. 

The box and yew parterre, interplanted with mounds of close clipped lavender and bordered by high yew hedges, is something out of A Draughtsman's Contract - very much the perfect winter garden (picture from slightly earlier in autumn last year though). I can only imagine its beauty enhanced by a frost. The kitchen garden is all but over, except for a row of splendid netted cabbages, and the ruby chard still shining on a pretty grey day. 

Very much worth the booking - it's owned by the National Trust and all its gardens remain open in this winter pandemic season. Plus coffee and a cake are still possible outside the cafe. Dress warmly, of course, and take a further stroll along a very pretty stretch of the river.

When art does not enhance the garden

The Chihuly at Kew is generally a masterpiece - see earlier post - but there was one part of it that really disturbed me.

Japanese gardens, as we know, are designed as one integral piece, and are works of art in their own right. Rocks are placed to be mountains. Different gravels form rivers and streams, or bolder strewn borders. Moss makes for painterly covering. A limited palate of well sited and well trained planting gives interest year round. It is an ancient art, practiced by masters and mediated over daily.

Japanese gardens are a joy to behold if you sympathise with the aesthetic. They can take your breath away. But what they do not need is an intrusion of alien colour.

I found the placing of coloured glass spheres at Kew so out of keeping as to be garish, so disrespectful to the garden as to be offensive. They were simply otiose and should have found a home elsewhere.

There, I've said it - quite a mis-step that made the garden look like a game of Disney marbles.

Chiswick House and Gardens

Many are the times I have roared passed the turn off on the A4 on my way out of London, yet I have never visited this lovely park and its beautiful buildings before. As well as a general interest in the idea of the garden and the re-sculpting of the British landscape that took place in the 18th century, started here by a certain William Kent, and a desire to take a stroll around a lake, admiring bird life, including a triumvirate of cormorants drying their wings, there was another reason for visiting that my companion wanted to share.

Some nearly fifty years ago a rather famous group of musicians used the grounds to shoot a promotional film for their new single. The band was The Beatles. The single was Paperback Writer (with Rain on the B side). You can find it on the internet these days, but it was the start of something visually new in the pop world. The fab four sing and play around a huge Cedar of Lebanon, the semi-circle of 'Roman' statuary and the conservatory, which houses a collection of century old, huge camelias, whilst also looking into the mid-distance and 'oozing cool' as the information poster has it.

Best enjoyed on a sunny autumn Sunday when everyone else is somewhere else. Look out for gnarly ash trees, the Indian Bean tree that despite almost falling over in a long ago storm now grows partly along the ground, the noisy cascade and the Japanese maples turning bright gold. The perfect place for a historical stroll.

Musee Albert Kahn

When the heat bouncing off the stone is too too much, it's time to seek out the shade. In all sorts of hidden places in Paris there is plenty of greenery, as in here at the end of line 10 at Boulogne Billancourt.

As I am currently plotting a small Japanese creation, this was the spot for a little gardening homework, rest and reflection. Not only is it a lovely stroll garden, but there is also a French fruit and roses garden and a more classically English garden with some fine specimen cedars and conifer wood.

Water is everywhere as pond, rill, stream, waterfall and cascade, all controlled to fall in pleasing harmony. Enormous koi cruise the main pond. A fringe of tadpoles edged a runnel.

It's the perfect place to forget the city, if you can close your ears to the traffic noise for a while, sit back and dream. Super Sunday.

Joan Miro Foundation

I tried very hard to like Miro today, but honestly, most of it left me a bit cold. I guess there just are some artists who I don't really go for and he is one of them. Great building though and an extensive collection with temporary exhibitions by other artists, which is part of the foundation's mandate.

Super views of Barcalona and it's near the Olympic Stadium for those into that kind of tourism. Plus extensive parks and gardens all around, including the fabulous Botanical Gardens where you can lush up the vegetation from Australia to Chile, South Africa to California without having to get on a plane.  

Today's best thing: having time to play with words with this translation from Dupin. Enjoy!

Joan Miro by Jacques Dupin

Translated and Versioned by Kate Noakes

With his eastward line

Tapered like a sabre

With his unknotted line

Like a fissure

He catches and frees space

Sun’s youth

The bird singing before its birth

And all the snakes in the green sky.

Night pollen glints on his lip:

A soaking of dew.