Mount Stewart Gardens

The gardens at Mount Stewart extends to 98 acres and are located on the shores of Strangford Lough, County Down, created by Edith, Marchioness of Londonderry in the 1920s and 30s.  They are famed around the world for their grandeur and the bold planting schemes of many rare and tender plants. The gardens' colourful botanical treasures capture the imagination and excite the senses. They are a living, breathing masterpiece and utterly unique, due to Lady Londonderry’s vision and the unusual micro climate of the site - she introduced a stunning array of original plants, creating a wonderful collection of North American, Asiatic and southern hemisphere plants, many of them rarely seen growing outdoors in the British Isles.

After the house's interior, (see yesterday's post), the Marchioness redesigned the gardens in the most lavish way possible. Prior to her husband's succession to the Marquessate in 1915 the gardens had been plain lawns with large decorative pots. She added the Shamrock Garden, the Sunken Garden, increased the size of the lake, added a Spanish Garden with a small hut, the Italian Garden, the Dodo Terrace, Menagerie, the Fountain Pool and laid out walks in the Lily Wood and rest of the estate. In 1957, she gave the gardens to the National Trust.

To this day,visitors to Mount Stewart are touched by her vision and the unique and vast collections of plants from North Vietnam, South Korea and Taiwan.  Edith's idea of garden sculpture was unique, quirky and fun.  Where else would you find dinosaurs, cheetahs, orang-utans, squirrels and dodos resting among the unique plants?  This distinctive statutory and hard-landscaping are an essential element of the gardens, framing views, providing backdrops and support for plants and a firm surface to walk on.

I suggest you grab a cup of something, put the pictures onto a slide show and sit back and enjoy this walk with me around the wonderful garden, finishing off with a short video from the garden that Lady Mari designed.

 

 

 I  know this was a long post, however as I had walked through these gates that have gold leaf on them having seen the garden and loved it, I did not want you to miss anything (for this season anyway), so I hope you enjoyed the gardens.

If the National Trust wished me to do another post sometime, I would be happy to oblige and link it into their site.

The video can be accessed at

http://youtu.be/o6xWzWhx4Ls

If there is a black space below, click it and the video will appear.

Now I hope you enjoyed  the walk and are not exhausted from it.

Many  thanks for visiting. Have a great day/evening.