Trip day last Wednesday.
We spent the day visiting the wonderfuls Blenheim Palace and Roushan Gardens, both quite close to Oxford.
Blenheim Palace, home to the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough and birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill, was built in the XVII Century, to celebrate the victory over the French during the Wars of the Spanish Succession. Its gardens were designed by “Capability” Brown and are considered his masterpiece. You can find more than a million trees and very different areas like the Formal, the Pleasure and Secret Gardens, the Cascade, the Dam… They deserve a visit.
In the afternoon we went to Rousham Gardens, kind of private gardens still runned and managed by the same family over the Centuries. What a wonderful place, to relax and enjoy, full of gorgeous herbaceous borders and a complete kitchen garden at the back. It was designed by William Kent and is one of the few which has escaped the transformation the alterations over the years.
Special attention to the Dahlias border. Huge, gorgeous and wonderful range of colours I’d never seen before in a composition with these plants.
Apart from the trip, we’ve continued on Thursday and Friday with our first classes of History of Garden Design. We’ve known the evolution of all kinds of art, from architecture to paintings, all influenced by the economic and political situation of each moment in History. That’s the only way you can understand art and landscape design, as an expression of the historic moment every artist has to live.
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