Cold comforts

At 600ft above sea level, Rockcliffe suffers in harsh winters, but, writes Tiffany Daneff, even the worst weather cannot subdue its many charms

- Tiffany Daneff

The garden at Rockcliffe, Gloucestershire

The home of Simon and Emma Keswick

LAST winter, we had -12° of frost for three weeks, remembers Emma Keswick, walking out onto the south-facing terrace at Rockcliffe in the Cotswolds, where she and her husband, Simon, have been living on and off since 1981. 'We are 600ft above sea level here and it does get very cold. Although we wrap things in winter, we lost a lot last year.'

Rockcliffe is one of the most beautiful gardens in the Cotswolds, whatever time of year one sees it. From the broad Yorkstone terrace, an immaculate avenue of beech obelisks-positioned slightly closer together at the far end to make the view seem longer -reaches across the perfectly striped lawn to the field beyond the ha-ha where Cotswold sheep graze. This point is marked with a simple bronze by sculptor Nigel Hall. In winter, when frost touches the topiary, the view is perhaps even more alluring than in late spring.

'The beech is predominantly out in the second week of May, when the new leaves are rice green,' adds Mrs Keswick, who has spent long periods in the Far East. When she and Mr Keswick first came to Rockcliffe, there was nothing much by way of a garden, only fields in front of the house. The first thing she did was to stride out into the field and mark the extent of the new garden. A beautifully made ha-ha was built along this perimeter. The couple then returned to live in Hong Kong, where Mrs Keswick, who has always been a keen gardener and is in demand for her designs, started to seriously consider the creation of the garden within the ha-ha.