The Herefordshire Wye Valley Holme Lacy Shipley Estate
Lecterns
Topiary in Gardens
Topiary
in Gardens is in three dimensions, and may be conceived to be
interesting by echoing the two dimensional image of a painting that
is unusual. Surrealist art originated as an avant-garde twentieth
century movement influenced by Sigmund Freud, leading onwards to the
works of the Belgium, Renee Magritte [1898 -1867] and the Spaniard,
Salvador Dali [1904 – 1988]. The picture on this page was
commissioned in 1979 from Paul Webb for a Mens Fashion Poster. It
transfers the real world of Topiary and Clothing, into an Alice in
Wonderland comfortable image within a Maze of clipped Yew. Within a
differing context, such image is capable of being created, to “Scare
Crows” from the vegetables at the end of the garden, if the body is
placed adjacent a Topiary head, set atop a wind break of clipped Yew
hedge. Here a Saville Row male figure, in timeless mode, is
seemingly detached from the female he aspires to find. She appears
to be slim and sophisticated. Perhaps over the hedge he is looking
at the desirability of meeting up with a Bust and IQ, of both 42.
Illusions and realities may come in many forms, for her appearance
of flight, here clearly indicates an obvious truth, that he has
indeed an empty head. Topiary, like ones hair, is best trimmed
moderately regularly. The July trim and Autumn cut, can sometimes
conveniently merge ones silhouette into the landscape, but seems not
to harmonise with Saville Row fashion. It is the timelessness of
well worn clothes, long past their sell by date – that can be the
essence of Gardening Fashion. They subtly camouflage the every day
identity of the wearer, while exuding nuances of a differing
personality, now far removed from the outside world. One where the
mind may have entered the Surreal world’s of growing the longest
exhibition Leek, seeking first prize with the most incredible Dahlia
or baffling a neighbour with the unpronounceable Latin name of an
annual flower he has never before seen. Perhaps an Allotment type
dream world, of half hidden glances, inquiry and friendships.Shipley Gardens Horse Power & Potential Vegetable Production.
A
hundred years after the arrival of the first motorised transport, we
still assess the relative engine size of each vehicle by the use of
the words – “horse power”. But prior to the advent of Petrol and
motorised transport, the power of horses, fuelled primarily by Hay,
was the engine that powered machinery and pulled all manner of
vehicles. Today, the fuel that powers our machines, silently
produces Carbon emissions upon a cancerous scale that is in the
process of destroying our planet earth, and in particular pollutes
the air of major cities, contributing to the ill health of their
populations. While Hay fuelled the Horse Power of Paris in the
1880’s prior to the advent of motorised vehicles, Parisians were
themselves fuelled by a process that originated from the spent fuel
emissions of the Horse Power. This virtuous circle collected the
emissions of dung from the streets and stables, and dispersed them
to the innumerable back street market gardens of the city. These
gardens of irregular shape were within the small open spaces, walled
in by the towering height of the buildings bordering the networks of
Parisian streets. Heated and sheltered by the proximity of the
stored heat and walls of the building, and with accumulations of the
fuel emissions of centuries to a depth of several feet, each
Parisian market garden produced as many as four crops in one year of
a spectrum of vegetables, not only for all Parisians, but also for
preparation for the capitals famous restaurants by the master chefs
of the city. It was in 1898 that Monsieur Escoffier began writing
down his recipes with the help of Monsieur Philias Gilbert. A few
years later, while in London at the Carlton, he collaborated with
Monsieur Emile Fetu, to produce the masterpiece, “a Guide to Modern
Cookery”, not so much a book of recipes, but rather a teaching
manual for all who wished to enter into the higher realms of the
arts of food preparation, and a classic of the 20th century.The Tree of Life
Some
trees, and perhaps some people, may be termed
Mutable.
The Oxford English Dictionary definition of that word says -:
subject to change; variable;
inconstant; fickle. Ornamental Garden
Conifers, are selected from mutations of a parent tree, originally
in the wild, and then subsequently in a nursery. Propagation is by
vegetative Cuttings. None can be propagated from seed as
mutations
revert back to their parent type. Some named varieties need a
helping hand to produce roots and are put within a process that
keeps them continually moist via mist, creating a situation whereby
their internal existing moisture cannot escape. They are now within
the sleep of a life support system, whereby they cannot die, yet
cannot freely live, until they have produced roots. Yet some species
that still prove difficult are grafted on to a root stock, which
needs to be of their direct parent family. The western coast of
North America, is the home of Thuya plicata, often seen along the
Pacific slopes growing to 150 to 200 feet high. I was in Oregan, to
meet a Conifer Nurseryman, and found him telling me that Thuya has
the extra ordinary property of permitting all Conifer species to
regenerate themselves, as cuttings grafted onto its Thuya Roots, and
that he used it as his grafting rootstock for all species and
varieties of Conifers. I knew that in history -
Arborvitae
[the tree of life],
was a name given by people of the 7th Century BC Etruscian town of
Clusium, to species of Thuya, but literature seems to fail to
mention the life giving properties of its rootstock. If I now cross
reference into Heart and Organ Transplants , one could suppose that
the grafting of the life of a differing specie onto the roots of
Thuya – seems to indicate that Thuya contains an anti rejection
molecule awaiting Pharmaceutical discovery, possibly applicable to
human life.The Paradise Of Eden
The
English word Paradise, has its roots in the language of Persia and
it’s civilisation – a thousand years before Christ – and subsequent
Biblical references. It’s literal meaning – may be taken as being –
an enclosed Garden. Circa 1840, Sir Henry Rawlinson, a British
soldier and Orientalist, came upon sculpted figures and inscriptions
carved in three languages, high up upon the rock face of a cliff –
in an area of Persia called Behistun. One set of inscriptions was in
Cuneform – at that time undeciphered. In the manner of the three
languages of The Rosetta Stone of the Nile, Rawlinson cross
referenced into the two known languages to decipher the unknown
Cuneform. while simultaneously finding that all texts revealed pre
Biblical history – in references to The Garden of Eden. According to
Genisis ii, 8 – it was eastwards: verses 10 – 14 describe a river as
flowing forth from it, and dividing into four streams. Some say one
of these is the Euphrates, and another, termed ‘Hiddekel’, may be
the Tigris. While this would suggest a site north of Babylon, no
satisfactory explanation of the other two rivers has yet been
offered. Modern research places Eden as being in the North west of
present day Iran – and the valley which today has the Industrial
town of Tabriz. But Eden, in the time of the Cuneform period, was a
real, living Shangri – La, the imaginery valley in the Himalayas,
the earthly paradise described by James Hilton in his 1933 Novel,
Lost Horizons.Maison de Plaisance. 19th Century Engraving. British Museum. London.
An example of a Chinese Courtyard Garden which commenced in the 4th Century BC and continued in this manner until the 19th Century
Experiments with Conifer Mutations
The
“Colchium autumnale” Bulb is also called “The Autumn Crocus”. And
some call it the “The Naked Lady”..because the bright green clumps
of leaves appear in late spring, in association with its formation
of stalk and lumpy seed head. Then everything withers and dies away.
Until Autumn, when its pink chalice shaped flower appears, naked and
unclothed by any leaf....I had read that the Bulb contained a
powerful alkaloid...called Colchine. And that some chemicals like
Colchine can induce Mutations. In the language of the book, a
chemical with the unusual characteristics of doubling the number of
the chromosomes in the nuclei of a plant cell. Diploids become
Tetraploids. Armed with this knowledge, I crushed a Colchine Bulb
and prepared a solution to what I supposed to be a suitable strength
and watered one of my unusual Conifer plants, in the expectation
that it might mutate, and grow on with new additional twists and
whorls and colour variations. It could be said to have dropped stone
dead on the spot. I did not proceed with the experiment. Some years
later, suffering an attack of Gout, supposedly the accretion of Uric
acid, and usually in the extremities of the foot, a prescription was
written for me, with the advice that it was a difficult ailment to
treat, but that I was being prescribed an old remedy that sometimes
achieved results. When I opened the small tablet bottle, the pills
seemed each to be the size of four Pin heads. Then I read the label.
Colchine. I remember lying in bed, wondering how it was going to
reach as far as my swollen big toe...without first killing me. And
then whether like “soil ph values”..the Colchine Alkali would dilute
the Gout’s Uric Acid...so that my ph might return to a neutrality of
ph7. It worked.