Bridport, famous for making nets and rope since a King’s charter in the 14th? century, has cute looking ancient buildings and gardens that are characteristically long … and I mean long!
The reason? So that networkers down the centuries could stretch out huge fishing nets hundreds of feet long while they manufactured or repaired them by hand.
This has resulted in Bridport having several areas within the town known as ‘Rope Walks’, those locations being the ancient remains of that, once vibrant, economy.
My little cottage, (and garden), is a remnant, a left over of that industry and, while in the heart of the town centre, it has this magical heritage and character starting with an enclosed ancient alleyway, (or rope walk), that feeds off from the main street. (In the summer, holidaymakers stop and look or take photos of that alley way because … well … because the darkness of the alley is juxtaposed by the glorious, briilliantly colourful image of light and flowers and distance that reveals itself to the eyes at the end of it.
In the summer, from the hight street, you can look down my passageway and see, first a glimpse of light, then, by focussing, see the explosion of flowers revealed through an open door … Hanging baskets suspended from my outhouses and then a 4ft high Meadowland Mix of flowers exploding from the rockery on the left … then your eye gets just a glimpse of the Georgian red brick and natural stone enclosed ‘end wall’ … a further 160 ft away at the far, far bottom of the garden. (It was formally an ancient workshop but that is where I built my Zen garden).
I get a young hippy fella playing all sorts of 60’s, 70’s and 80’s cover music cross legged at the end of the passage on the street in the summer. His music floats down the hallway and into the cottage of a Saturday market day.
I describe the long, narrow footprint as “my 1940’s garden” because, when I moved in five years ago, just about all of the 160ft garden was overgrown, really overgrown … with thorne bushes 6ft high … and next door, still standing at the time, was a 1940’s Nissan hut, (Google “Nissan Hut”), an arched building with a curved tin roof also completely enclosed by brambles – a relic of the second world war.
When the brambles were all excavated from my garden, I found ornaments, garden tools, machinery and assorted stuff, all dating from that period … plus an 17th – 18th century metal toy I’d describe as ‘a Trojan Charioteer’, entirely complete with two horses, the trojan soldier and his chariot with spoked wheels!
So … that alone ‘qualifies’ me to passionately describe my garden as a 1940’s garden.
There is another layer though.
The fact that a neighbour,Bob, and I, together tend such an expansive area of land right in the heart of a town, is regarded as a rare thing these days. ie A completely genuine and authentic ‘vegetable garden’ of the kind you do actually see in older properties, that is true, BUT … most folk these days live in modest, modern homes with typically small gardens that don’t lend themselves to 40ft of potato plants, six or seven rows deep … or rows of beans on canes or legions of lettuce, carrots or cabbages as far as the eye can see!
Sure. Seasons, (and motivations), change each year so the plot changes depending on mood, circumstances, weather or practical use.
Some years ago, I made the garden a nesting box, secured it to an ivy coated derelict wall at the far end of the garden, (facing south), about 8ft up and left the round entrance hole blocked to enable the box to weather in for a year.
A year later, I uncovered the entrance and anticipated getting some interest from breeding blue or yellow tits … but it has never happened. 🙁 What am I doing wrong?
Landscaping the area below the box, an area about 25ft wide by 20 ft long, I introduced shingle, boulders and an 8ft pew, (bench), making sure I didn’t disturb the ground where I saw a slow worm. That part of the garden, (my Zen garden), is now a very calm, contemplation area where I can crack open a beer with friends and female company of a summer’s evening.
And talking of wildlife … Where do I start?
An orchestra of garden birds, Slowworms, Hedgehogs, a Badger, a Grey squirrel that, (I think), lives in the 50ft Eucalyptus tree next door), mating Herring gulls, a Fox, circling Hawks … and, bizarrely, on one occasion, a majestic, full grown, adult deer, (with antlers), going ballistic, first appearing in my garden before leaping the 5 ft brick walls into Molly’s and then the Chine takeaway’s back gardens!!
Further up the garden, near a shed I introduced, I created a pagoda affair to provide a natural break in the whole garden. I have sited several climbers in this area, Honeysuckle and Clematis and also secured trellis to the side of the shed so that it will spread and eventually produce a wall of foliage and flowers. Below and behind this area, the normal, bumpy and unkempt lawn will stay the same but above it, I created a new lawn that was, originally, as flat as a snooker table!
Using the finest, suitable grass seed, this area was planned to have a couple of sun loungers on it, being situated just perfect to look up the garden, past my vegetable plots and towards the actual cottage and the eastern side of the property.
Another new feature I added, was a half dozen hanging towers. “Flower Tower” (TM). They are like high rise hanging baskets with a depth of about 18″ each and explode with colour and flowers once the bedding plants I got from Lidl took hold. I was using Lobelia, (Deep blue flowers), Impatiens, (A pinky red variety), Agertum, (Tiny mauve petals), Begonia, (Big pink flower petals), some yellow, orange and gold Tagetes and added some amazing, blood red Salvia flowers to provide some drama.
Old favourites like Meadowland mix and Summer flower mix are usually sown down one side of the rockery near the house, simply by scattering them where they are intended to grow – and grow they do – to a height of 3 – 4ft. An explosion of colour and variety that ensure that bees and butterflies can call by to collect their pollen.
I‘ve also xperimented with various garden herbs, some peppers, cucumbers and water melon, something I have not grown before.
I have one neighbour and we share much of the vegetable plot area. Consequently, to the amazement of visitors and customers, when I beckon them down the garden exitedly in response to their expressed amazement, we have to walk past rows of proud, tall potato plants, beans on canes that look like Native American tents, Sweet William blooms, canes of peas, legions of onions and the odd exotic fruit or root vegetable crawling about nearby.
The year before last, I aquired a greenhouse AND dug out a 20ft x 6ft wildlife pond, (now full of fat goldfish), and, by this previous year just past, I’m sure my garden would have been in the running to win our annual best garden award. (I didn’t enter becasue, seriously, I’m not so sure I would have evn wanted the world to know what a paradise I have just off the High street! 🙂
For my sins, I’ve done virtually nothing in the garden these past 12 months, (being diverted by business and a busier social life), though, even while I write these words, my garden is still lovely as an unkempt space but … it will have to wait till the spring before I bring it back to life fully again next year.