Shot! West Dean Gardens
Following months of lockdown, one of Britain’s most renowned gardens was one of the first to reopen to the public. Although not everything was accessible, what there was to see was a feast for the eyes.
In 1932, Edward James inherited the 6,350-acre West Dean Estate near Chichester in West Sussex. He was just 25, the youngest of five children and the only son. His father, William Dodge James, had made a fortune in America through copper mining and in the railroad industry.
A lifetime supporter of surrealist art — Edward was the major benefactor to the Spanish artist Salvador Dali, whose career would not have taken off without his financial assistance. After travelling extensively in America promoting Dali, he began building Las Posaz, a vast property in Mexico.
The project became so consuming that by 1964 he divested himself of his past life, selling his vast art collection, and ploughing the proceeds into his Mexican jungle folly.
He transferred the West Dean estate to a foundation that today still runs it as a craft college, teaching skills such as gilding, calligraphy and clock repair.
Edward continued to build at Las Pozas until his death in 1984. His body was brought back to West Dean and is buried in the estate’s 49-acre St Roche’s arboretum. Started in the 1830s, this was where he kept his golden pheasants. Over the years he also made a significant contribution to its planting, specialising in exotic, pendulous, contorted and twisted trees.
As well as the house, now run as West Dean College, the estate’s 90-acre gardens are open to the public — as they have been even before Edward’s inheritance. Today, they’re renowned as being one of the best gardens in the country and for having arguably Britain’s finest kitchen garden.
I know West Dean quite well having visited the gardens probably three or four times, but I hadn’t been back for quite a few years. When I learnt it would be one of the first big gardens to reopen after months of lockdown — it closed at the end of March — I knew I had to make a return trip.
Not only had West Dean got a new head gardener — a big deal when the previous incumbents had presided over the gardens for 28 years — but I was curious to see for myself how a major attraction operated under the very strict measures as a consequence of Covid.
Needing to reserve a time slot online, I was unable to go on the first weekend of opening and with bad weather scheduled for the following week I plumped for what was supposed to be the first day of sunshine.
While the sun stayed hidden for most of the time I was there, the rain thankfully also kept away, although it had rained the day before.
The big bonus of seeing the gardens — or for that matter, any major attraction — under Covid regulations, is that there are far fewer people. At the time of my visit, West Dean were limiting visitors to just a fraction of what they would expect on a normal summer’s day.
As you drove in, the first thing that greeted you was a welcome sign stating the gardens are Covid-19 Secure. Your name has to be on the list before you can gain entry.
Now it has to be said, once you’re in, what you get to see is not the full West Dean experience. To ensure social distancing, parts of the gardens have had to be closed off and a one-way system operates in the walled gardens.
Unfortunately, West Dean’s most famous feature, its 13 impeccably maintained Victorian glasshouses built in 1891 and 1900 — were all closed to the public.
As the walled garden is bereft of most of the blooms one would expect to see and the house itself is undergoing a mammoth replacement of its 126-year-old roof — in fact, it’s almost entirely under scaffolding — it’s unfair for me to ‘review’ West Dean at this time. Instead, consider this as merely my impressions of what I was able to experience during my visit.
Within the walled gardens, my eye was drawn to a fabulous pink dahlia. Sadly, there were very few in bloom in the usually bounteous cutting beds, but the beautifully formed American Dawn looked stunning, especially with water droplets on its petals.
I also got some nice shots of the few hot borders that were in bloom, before stumbling on a small display of succulents.
These fleshy-leaved plants thrive with their distinctive shapes and colours, are one of my favourite plant species to shoot.
For me, they have a special significance at West Dean. Not only are they some of the most surreal looking plants, but many originate from South America, where Edward James spent much of his life.
For those reasons, I think they should be a major feature at West Dean. Although I’m not sure they are.
Outside of the Walled Gardens, there are three areas of West Dean that impressed.
The first of these, the Sunken Garden, is a relaxing place to spend some time. Following a six year restoration, this square, rockery and raised border landscaped feature reopened in 2014.
My favourite part of it is a set of ivy covered stairs that bear the inscription ‘Aspice Respice Prospice” Latin for Past, Present and Future. That being said, it appears the engravers made a typo with the wording as the first word should have read ‘Adspice’ not ‘Aspice’.
This kind of whimsical feature is just the kind of thing that West Dean needs more of. With a little more imagination, the Sunken Garden has potential to become a truly sublime spot.
Immediately adjacent and bisecting the north lawn, is one of West Dean’s most celebrated features: the 100m-long pergola designed in 1911 by the famous ‘Arts and Crafts’ landscape architect Harold Peto.
Peto had been commisioned by William and Evelyn James to refashion the interior of West Dean in Edwardian style. His pergola’s columns and arches are the backdrop to many varieties of magnolia, clematis, rose and honeysuckle.
Its centrepiece is a rectangular waterlilly pond. There is no doubt the pergola is one of the most photogenic locations of the gardens and one can be sure it takes on a very different feel depending on the light and the season. The best time to see it however is when it’s covered in wisteria.
To get to the third area of the garden you need to walk past the nineteenth century house. Flint faced and crenelated, it’s an imposing Grade II-listed building. Although neither as attractive nor as pretty as Goodwood, which is just down the road, it’s still an interesting edifice, if a little too brutalistic for my taste.
Beyond the house is the Spring Garden, my favourite part of West Dean by far. Why it was given that name I have no idea, but it doesn’t give a clue to what this atmospheric part of the gardens is all about.
The best way to describe it is a kind of fantastical landscape, full of tropical trees and palms, set alongside a small rivulet (actually the River Lavant) with quirky flint bridges and exotic planting.
As you stroll along its secret walkways, lush vistas attract your gaze. For a moment you could be forgiven for thinking you’re in Costa Rica rather than southern England. It really is a little piece of paradise.
If I were West Dean, this is the area of the gardens that I’d focus on developing, making it even more surreal, with more unusual features, artworks and planting. It really has the potential to be an even more special, even more magical, place.
Despite the lockdown conditions, I really enjoyed my afternoon at West Dean. It’s a great place to get away from it all, to escape the ordinary and take in some wonderful and often unexpected floral vistas.
Of course, you need to be aware that much of what you’re seeing is nowhere near how it would look in a normal year. Only being able to have a tiny proportion of its gardening team working at any one time, meant dealing with priorities such as ensuring West Dean’s irreplaceable species collections were cared for.
Like so many attractions, there’s no doubt that the economic impact of being closed for many months and then having to operate on a reduced visitor capacity, will be felt for years to come. These days, few places can rely on wealthy benefactors like Edward James and instead have to be creative in bringing in revenue.
There’s also no doubt, if they are to survive, places like West Dean will have to be even more creative in the future. As a predominantly outdoor attraction, gardens have a big advantage — they have fresh air and plenty of space. In addition, what they have to offer changes with the seasons, giving visitors reasons for returning.
Having seen West Dean emerge from lockdown, I’m looking forward to going back and exploring more of what it has to offer. Once the scaffolding has come down and everything’s opened up, it promises to be an even better visual experience.
Behind the shot: The majority of these images were taken with the iPhone 8 Plus and I have to say the quality of the shots it delivers continues to impress, so much that I’m using my iPhone way more than my trusty Olympus OM-D E-M1. In fact, it’s so good I find it hard to tell the difference. Despite the weather being overcast, I’m really pleased my images look as lush as they do. Shot at West Dean on 8 July 2020.
My thanks to Rachel Aked at The Edward James Foundation for arranging my visit and my interview with West Dean’s new head gardener, Tom Brown, which you can also find here on Medium.
About the author: Based in Sussex-by-the-Sea, on England’s south coast, Gary is a creative writer and image-maker. He specialises in out of the ordinary portraits of musicians and people with interesting faces, as well as photographing some of the world’s finest flowers and gardens.
