The gardens at Mount Stewart are the creation of Edith Londonderry, the singular visionary who was
the wife of the 7th Marquess of Londonderry. On one of her first visits to the property
whilst it was still under the stewardship of her predecessor, Edith described the house and gardens
at Mount Stewart as one of the dampest, darkest, and saddest places she had ever stayed in.
Once she had taken up residence Edith set to with great vigour to remove two giant holm oaks to allow herself space to create.
It is worth noting though that the woodland has never left Mount Stewart.
Even in the formal gardens one has the sense of the trees leaning into the spaces.
The formal gardens are impressive and demonstrate Edith's sense of perspective,
design, and imagination within formal structures whilst at once subverting and pouring through
her own character. But they are not the only gardens here at Mount Stewart.
Outside of the hedges and the postcard-publication images are the woodland gardens and rhododendron woods
that were her great love. Areas well worth exploring with narratives well worth telling.
Guests of the Londonderry family would have entered the property via the West Gatehouse
and been drawn along this road here, The Drive. Before reaching this point they would have
travelled alongside the tidal Strangford Lough with fantastic views in all weather.
Whilst it is tarmacked now it would have been a more simple pastoral affair.
Many of the grandest trees on the property are growing along this stretch including this magnificent Monterey Pine,
pinus radiata. A fantastic specimen well over 100 years old. This species was planted
in many coastal gardens due to their ability to withstand aerosol salinity and high winds.
It was throughout and around these historic plantings that Edith worked her own artistry,
utilising block plantings of, at the time, thoroughly modern large-leaved rhododendrons.
Sinogrande and macabeanum amongst them.
At this point the drive approaches at an acute angle,
so that at first glance the house appears, while grand, nowhere near its full proportions.
At this point the skilled carriage man would slow the horses to barely a movement and the true breadth
and scale of the house would be experienced in its full awe-inspiring capacity. It was quite the journey.
The Rose Garden was originally called the Ladies Garden, and Edith referred to it as the Atrium Garden.
It's located in a walled enclosure to the most southerly point of the walled garden which is itself an element that preceded Edith.
In 1919 the South Garden which is what we now know as the Italian Garden was envisaged by Edith as a rose garden.
Roses didn't succeed in the parterres. Edith concluded that this was due to the proximity to the wind,
and more importantly, the salt that it carried from the lough along with the sandy soil that had been left behind.
By 1926 the good roses worth saving were being moved up to the Atrium Garden. In her 1926 diary
Edith writes that the rose garden is here with family namesakes being planted. Most being bred by
famous Northern Irish rosarians such as the Dicksons of Newtownards and the McCreedys of Portadown.
It is also in this diary that she writes 'No senseless rose will ever be found at Mount Stewart'.
We have found it impossible to source these namesake roses for the garden in its current iteration
but Edith wrote that: 'All rose species I have here, also the roses of bygone days,
so beautiful and full of charm. I've marked out some modern kinds,
providing the revamped rose garden with its ideology. Any rose with scent and beauty, old, new,
shrub, climbing, hybrid tea is welcome in the rose garden'.
The current rose garden was opened in spring 2018 with the refurbishment of the hard landscaping done by gardeners,
and volunteers, and travelling Erasmus groups. With planting largely completed but always ongoing.
This year the gardeners found evidence of a type of fungal or bacterial canker on the roses,
and it's known that cold wet winters can increase the likelihood of these forming.
But this is part of the dichotomous joy of growing roses.
You can't grow roses unless you're going to incubate their myriad sicknesses.
It's important to slow yourself down in a garden to take the time to view
and appreciate your plants as individuals as much as an entire composition.
Down here in the fernery we have a number of exotic tree ferns growing as it's almost always wet.
And the overhead canopy provides ideal shelter from frosts as in this location with quite a
distance from the climatic influences of the lough.
Moving through the fernery over Himalayan-style bridges built by the staff and volunteers
you come to an area recently created, the Himalayan Walk. This winding path transports the walker
to the foothills of the Himalaya with scented epiphytic Maddenia rhododendrons planted into tree stumps,
and strange knobbly bamboos to be pushed through. And the path continues along the rhododendron walks of Clark's Hill
amongst some of the best plants collected by the likes of forest rock and kingdom ward.
The gardens here at Mount Stewart were begun in earnest by Lady Edith in the early 1920s
and with the support of our members we hope for them to be here for many centuries more. Thank you.