The Gardens of England #1: Marle Place

This is a private garden in Kent. Peaceful green spaces flowing one into another, whimsical topiary, a pool for eye candy, amphibians for an earful (see below), and sculpture which isn’t at all objectionable even to philistines like myself who more often than not give anything newer than Michelangelo short shrift.

egghead
Not David, but not bad

I’ll admit here and now that I mostly go to gardens because my wife likes them and I like her. Our usual routine is that she flits about the flowers like a honeybee while I seek out the nearest shade.

mrs

anotherflower

However, something about Marle Place captivated me. I think it started with the pool

pool

Pretty standard as small bodies of chlorinated water go, but something about it pulled me out of my usual drowsinated garden state and made me thirsty for more.

me

What more can you ask for than a swing? The National Trust doesn’t provide swings (and if they did they’d probably charge extra for it). Even the knot seemed pleasingly tied. I was never a Scout and have no idea what kind it was.


???

Here was another charmed place to sit for the spell that was being cast on me.

bench

Sculpture was scattered about, fitting right in wherever we stumbled upon it. I was particularly taken by

sculpture4

And what’s this?

marleoverview

Could it be…?

marlebike1

That was very hard for my autofocus to latch on to. Of course, a rusty old bike is almost de rigueur in a garden.

bike

We were served a very nice lunch much coveted by some of the locals

bantam

then left, entirely satisfied. That amphibian?

lilypadfrog

His beloved always seemed to stay one lily-pad ahead of him.

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