Eccentric England: The Friendly Ghosts of Renishaw Hall - Gardenista
The word “eccentric” has a lot of currency at Renishaw Hall in Derbyshire. Though the head gardener uses it to describe Sir George Sitwell (the garden’s turn-of-the-century mastermind), the word is normally associated with Sitwell’s children, Edith, Osbert, and Sacheverell. A gothic gate in the woods, put up by the felicitously named Sir Sitwell Sitwell. The estate office, bearing a plaque with the legend: “George Sitwell, Baronet, Renishaw Hall.” The estate color is a sublime sea green, taken up at the suggestion of Sir Edwin Lutyens. Derbyshire, also known as the Peak District, is about three hours from London and has a dramatic landscape, compared with its flatter neighbors in the Midlands. The ballroom garden, its box spires a visual nod to the finials on the roof. The ballroom and billiard room were both remodeled by Lutyens, though he grew tired of being asked for free advice about the garden from Sir George. Closed shutters of the ballroom. Edith in particular was a proto-punk of the 1920s, who relished performance art, her singular looks adding to the experience. The entrance to the garden is shady and any attempt at grass has been laid aside in favor of foxgloves, euphorbia, and for later months, nicotiana and varieties of hydrangea. A temple in the bluebell wood. Dame Edith excused herself from visiting it frequently because, according to head gardener David Kevesten, she claimed to fear “that her senses would overwhelm her.” An area of the garden known as The Second Candle. The First Candle is on the other side of the Middle Lawn. Some of the ruins on the estate are souvenirs from the travels of Sir George, who eventually retired to Italy, leaving the cold, unelectrified house in the hands of his son Osbert. The ruinous state of the house was addressed by his nephew Sir Reresby Sitwell in the 1960s. The garden layout which Sir George created was a strike against Capability Brown’s landscape movement which had swept away the original garden. A battered lead planter with authentic detailing (SS 1803). It is possible that he might not have been christened ‘Sitwell’ had his parents known that he would inherit two Sitwell estates from distant relations. Renishaw from the winding drive. Before coal was discovered on the estate, the family’s fortune had had its ups and downs which then went down again after the gilded youth of the Literary Trio.