EVEN without all the virus havoc that has turned the world upside down in 2020, this was going to be a momentous year for Sir Roy Strong. On August 23, the eminent historian, garden-maker, prolific author and former museum director celebrates his 85th birthday. The latest volume of his Diaries will be published in November and he’s about to start writing his 50th book. He is also presently wrapping up his furniture, paintings and treasured trinkets for something nobody expected: a big house move.
This means, of course, departure from The Laskett and its famous garden, made from scratch since 1973 by Roy and his late wife, the opera and theatre set designer, Julia Trevelyan Oman. Sir Roy had already made arrangements to leave the garden on his death, together with a generous endowment, to the horticultural charity Perennial. ‘As it stood, I was expecting to leave here in my coffin, feet first,’ he says. ‘But, I’m moving nearer to 90; I’m not immortal. I’ve got a pacemaker and all the rest of it; I realised I could not go on here in old age.’
Only as recently as mid-February did Sir Roy experience his epiphany and decide to move on, opening up a brand new chapter in his long life. Decision made, he searched for an elegant townhouse in the nearby town of Ledbury, found exactly the right one straight away and bought it. Then arrived the long period of national lockdown, which delayed completion of purchase by several months. At last, it is his, only undergoing some modifications before he moves in this autumn. But what of the garden that Sir Roy has created over nearly 50 years and is so generously leaving behind, for charitable gain and public enjoyment?
Denne historien er fra August 19, 2020-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra August 19, 2020-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
