a unique garden open for the public

.

Sunday 12 th of june would be the incredible occasion, to visit London’ s lesser known Private gems. Eccleston Square Gardens. Unfortunately its creator Roger Philips, a great Horticulturalist, broadcaster and artist died. His books are part of my upbringing when I was a teenager. I started an adventure a week before his death in november between Tresco Abbey Gardens and my beloved Great Dixter, and on a pit stop in London, i could not help to buzz at his door, to get into the shrine of my teenager’s fantasies. But i was denied in the Holy Land, by his daughter due to my master’s ill health, which escalated few days later. In Tresco I could see many of the plants I dreamt in his books. On my return from Tresco, i was some days in London, before going to Great Dixter, and I could not help but going tol this little known mecca of Horticulture. There I met, what i know consider a friend: The Headgardener Pavel Votapek. My meeting was controversial, but this very attitude got us closer. Pavel has an incredible environment science background, and he was a purist, less interested in horticultural varieties, but ecological relations and pure species. Him and Roger really complimented each other, but still the Holy secrets were kept under Roger’s scrutiny. My annoying questioning attitude made Pavel aware, that it was his turn, to take the incredible legacy .He is now studying Roger notes, about Camellias, Roses and Ceanothus( they got the national collection. I truly admire people, who question themselves and go beyond their comfort zone. Pavel is now integrating his ecological with the great Horticultural legacy by Roger.here a bit of story of the garden http://ecclestonsquaregardens.com/page/about-the-garden The Story of this garden is complex. This the result of one discussion with Pavel “here at eccleston square , we have a very complex and diverse combination of ecological niches and biotopes. The Homo sapiens sapiens :)occupies a big niche of this complex ecosystem. The official top of the ecological pyramid are the Residents , there is a n of Keys. tennis court, picknicks etc, and part of our work is to take care of our beloved residents. The railings and keys are supposed to protect from London’s stress, and visitors have to call us to enter and visit, or in special occasions like this sunday. A big part of our work is to reconcile the needs of our official resident and non of like Homeless, where we experience all the sufferering of such a tough city. A big part of our job is to clean needles and bottle from taxi drivers which occupy a big part of my job. As Stefano Mancuso said : people are blind to plants. This is a garden with a unique collection of plants but passers litter it and ignore the beauty and history of this garden. I come from an ecological background, but thanks to Roger , which was such a Renaissance men with such a combo of botany, culture . I was interrested just in natives, but here the balance of native and alien, gets a richer environment for animals living in an urban area. Here plants flower all winter giving nectar to pollinators etc. There is a high biomass and space for insects birds etc in winter and many hips from the roses for the birds . The cultivated hybrids, here talk about the story of mankind . For exemple the common C japonica arrived in our gardens, because the Chinese did not wanted to give up the monopoly of tea, camellia sinensis , and under pressure of the brits they gave the camellia japonica. now we can still see ’Comtessa Lavinia Maggi’ which reveals the importance of italian breeders in the 18 th century. The camellias are now preparing the new shoots that would be collected of it were tea camellias. the camellias are also preparing their fruits , which are similar to camellia oleifera used for beauty products.heritage varieties if not propagated are lost forever, so in this garden we have several collections to preserve the genetic diversity. chinese roses were brought to europe in tea cargoes and some of them are called tea scented for this reason ex lady hillingdon and she was the viceroy of indias wife but she did not like his husband and whenever he was coming he was closing her eyes and thinking of england. the chinese roses brought reflowering habit but lack of scent. Here we got many rare varieties of moss roses which have hairy olfactory glands .. an example is capitaine basroger named after a french hero who saved a lot of british citizens. ... photo taken from eccleston square website