Townhead garden

Last Sunday Helen, the grandchildren and I took ourselves off to do some garden visiting. It was quite by chance I had found out about Townhead having an open garden day. I had spotted a poster in a nurseries a few weeks ago and then read an article in the local press. Townhead, a Georgian house  had been neglected for many years and was taken over in 2008 by  new owners who have restored the house and gardens.

Townhead is in the village of Slaidburn in the Ribble Valley. Our journey there took us through the pretty village of Waddington.  Unfortunately it was the day they were having their annual duck race and scarecrow festival. That slowed us down a bit as the village was heaving with people and traffic, but it did give us chance to do a bit of scarecrow spotting as we drove through at snail's pace. Kept the grandchildren amused.

Finally  we got to Slaidburn, parked in the village and walked the short distance up the hill to Townhead.The house appeared to have doors on at least three sides so we weren't sure which was the front door, but that didn't  matter as we weren't going into the house, just the garden. We found lawns, a pond and beautiful flower borders at the front of the house (well I  think it was the front). Most of the borders  had a purple, pink and blue theme.   We loved the purple pink and blues of the alliums, nepeta, astrantia and candelabra primula. I especially loved the nepeta because I can never get it established in my garden.    

There were one or two lovely old looking metal seats in various places around the garden.  We wondered if   they were from the original garden.  I liked the fact that they were a bit rusty with paint flaking off.  They may not have been very comfortable but added character and were ok to have a short rest.

Our entrance ticket included tea and cake and the terrace was very busy with people eating and drinking.  We had tea and cake even though we had only just arrived.  It pacified the grandchildren.

After our refreshments we moved around towards the back of the house (or it could have been the front) along to a little path called 'the posh passage'. At the end of the posh passage we had two ways to go--the walled garden or over to look at the old pedal cars.  We opted for the cars to start with, we knew the walled garden would take a long time to explore.  There was more than cars here , there were old prams and all sorts of old things.

 

We entered a small building which looked like a workshop with an amazing array of old tools--Richard would have loved this but he had been happy to stay at home.  Upstairs was the toilet.  Now I don't usually include visits to the toilet on my blogs but this was quite an interesting building with lots of old paraphernalia dotted about.  Old stone pots, metals baths, pictures and more tools.  When we got back down the narrow wooden stairs we met a man who may have been a workman or he could have been the owner in disguise.  He told us that seven people used to live in this little house. I hadn't realised up to that point that the building had been lived in at some time.

Our next visit was to the walled garden. We were well pleased with this, there was so much to see. There were fruit trees and vegetables, old brick walls, old plant pots, old metal tubs. I was in gardenalia heaven.

There was also a wild flower area and the most wonderful long herbaceous border which had peonies to die for. I reluctantly had to tear myself away  from the walled garden to enter the The Folly.  This was an interesting wildlife area with a collection of quirky stone and wooden features.

Townhead was an interesting garden with something for everyone. I would happily go there again but I think the day was a one off.  I hope there was enough good feedback to encourage the owners to do it all again next year.