Penelope Hobhouse

Penelope Hobhouse ( born November 20, 1929 in Moyola Park, Castledawson, Northern Ireland ) is a garden writer and teacher.

Life

Hobhouse was born Penelope Chichester -Clark, daughter of the Anglo - Irish James Lennox- Conyngham Chichester -Clark and attended school at North Foreland Lodge. She then studied at Girton College, Cambridge Business Administration and graduated in 1951 with an MA from. On May 17, 1952 she married Paul Rodbard Hobhouse († 1994), the son of Sir Arthur Hobhouse († 1965). From the marriage Georgina Dehra Catherine went ( born March 9, 1953), Niall Alexander (* August 29, 1954 ) and David Paul ( born September 9, 1957) produced. The marriage was annulled in 1983. In 1983 she married John Melville Malins, who died in 1992. She lived in Bettiscombe in Dorset, before she moved in September 2008 back to Hadspen, where she put on a new garden.

In her youth, Hobhouse was not interested in gardens, barely knew wildflowers and had no knowledge of botany. Your first garden she put in the overgrown garden of a farmhouse in Somerset on the 17th century, where she lived with her husband Paul Hobhouse, inspired by a visit by Phyllis Reiss ' garden in Tintinhull House in Somerset. Overall, it keeps visiting other gardens for the most important excitation in the design of its gardens. Your friend John Raven, Professor of Classics at Cambridge, gave her a first reading list for the garden. The garden of John and Faith Raven in Docwra at Cambridge leads, together with Abbotsbury and Knightshayes Court in Devon by Sir John Heathcote Amory and his wife among the gardens on that influenced their early development. Many of their plants they acquired in Margery Fish's Nursery in East Lambrook. They planted their garden with old varieties of climbing roses, irises (Iris unguicularis ) and sumac and limited the first flower colors on white and yellow.

1968 the family moved to the estate of the Hobhouse in Hadspen House in Somerset over. The garden of 3.5 hectares was totally wild. He had been used as a vegetable garden during the Second World War as part of the campaign " Digging for Victory", then tried two unskilled workers unsuccessfully to hold fence winds, bryony and blackberries in check. With the help of a gardener and the abundant use of plant poisons Hobhouse began to transform the garden into a manageable system. They used mainly small trees and shrubs, under which they planted bulbs. They also used a few of the surviving garden plants that originated in part from the family garden Fox Strangway in Abbotsbury in Dorset. Shrubs have been used to repress weeds. Lawn was replaced by low shrubs or perennials. The choice of plants was often determined by the preference of individual species. Overall, they tried to recreate something of the Edwardian garden plan. She received many plants of John Hussey, the head gardener in Abbotsbury. In addition, Hobhouse continued to operate a vegetable garden. They also presented a meadow on, in the tulips, common fritillary, meadow cranesbill, spotted orchid and bee orchid grew.

The transformation of the garden was completed in 1974, and Hobhouse published a book about it. The work on the book forced her first time to acquire the basics of botanical nomenclature. She joined the British Society for History of Gardens in and visited on their excursions into the 70s for the first time gardens around the world, eg in Tuscany. After the publication of her book "Colour in your Garden" Hobhouse began lecture series in the United States and went so well with the local garden traditions familiar.

Among the authors who have influenced, Graham Stuart Thomas calls with whose book on old garden roses, Hilliers Manual of Trees and Shrubs, Christopher Lloyd, John Raven and Gertrude Jekyll.

Until 1993 she worked with John Malins the gardens of Tintinhull House in Somerset for the English National Trust. These were much more care than in Hadspen designed and set up especially perennials and annual flowers. The garden is divided by hedgerows and follows a set color scheme with the classic English long discounts.

Style

Hobhouse emphasizes that the garden of the landscape should adapt. In particular, the garden should unobtrusively merge into the surrounding landscape. This did not prevent them to plant aggressive invasive plants such as Caucasian hogweed. She emphasizes that gardens should not open up at a glance, and it follows Lawrence Johnston's concept of garden rooms, which, however, the local soil and capable of adapting. A garden is not just a collection of plants, he embodies the interpretation of their historical significance by the gardener and am supported by the knowledge of their needs.

Overall, their success is expected to decline to the fact that they showed how a traditional English garden with little money and maintenance costs could be transformed into a pseudo - farmhouse style, nevertheless maintained some of the pretensions of cottage gardens.

Work

Hobhouse was deputy editor of the magazine Gardens Illustrated and taught at the University of Essex. In 1996, she moderated for "House and Garden Television " in the U.S. series " The Art and Practice of Gardening " ( Perennial Productions. It operates the company Penelope Hobhouse and Associates with a branch Nan Sinton in Boston, Massachusetts.

Works

Hobhouse designed gardens in England, Scotland, France, Italy, Spain, Germany and the U.S., including:

  • Landscape garden in Walmer Castle in Kent in honor of the 95th birthday of Elizabeth Bowes -Lyon, the "Queen Mother"
  • The Country Garden for the Royal Horticultural Society in Wisley
  • Garden for Jil Sander in Germany
  • An English cottage garden for Steve Jobs at the Waverley Street in Palo Alto, the fit to the mock-Tudor style of the house (1996).

Publications

  • The Country Gardener. London, Francis Lincoln, 1976 ( reprint 1995)
  • The National Trust, A book of Gardening, Ideas, Methods, Designs - A practical guide. London, Pavilion / Michael Joseph 1986.
  • Garden Style. London, Frances Lincoln in 1988.
  • Plants in Garden History, London, Pavilion 1992 ( Gardening through the Ages, New York 1992 ISBN 1-85145-545-0 )
  • Penelope Hobhouse on Gardening ' London, Frances Lincoln 1994. ISBN 0-7112-0816-6 ( MacMillan, New York)
  • A Gardener's Journal. London, Frances Lincoln 1997. ISBN 0-7112-1188-4 ( Willow Creek, United States)
  • Penelope Hobhouse 's Natural Planting. Henry Holt & Co, 1997. ISBN 978-0805044904
  • Penelope Hobhouse 's Garden Designs. London, Frances Lincoln, 2000.
  • Colour in Your Garden, Frances Lincoln, 2003.
  • Gardens of Persia. Kales Press ( USA: Cassell Illustrated, 2006 ISBN 184403433X. )

Awards

  • Award of Excellence of the Garden Writers Association of America for the book " Gardening Through the Ages " in 1993
  • Royal Horticultural Society's Victoria Medal of Honour in December 1996
  • Lifetime Achievement Award from the Writers Guild of Garden in November 1999
  • Honorary Doctor of Birmingham University
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