OPENING the shutters at Glin Castle in Co Limerick of a morning, generations of Catherine FitzGerald’s ancestors would have looked out at the same ring of sessile oaks as her family and guests do today. Descendants of the Killarney forest that once stretched down to the shores of the Shannon river in front of the castle, the gnarly, moss- and fern-covered branches of the oaks protect the 10 acres of landscaped garden from the westerly winds that whip up the estuary. ‘You can see their arms are outstretched and they circle the place to create an embrace,’ says Miss FitzGerald. ‘They are its presiding spirit.’
The family has owned the Glin demesne since the 13th century and this genius loci is of great importance to Miss FitzGerald.
It is something she always seeks out in her work as a landscape designer on large projects, such as Hillsborough Castle near Bel- fast (‘Building for peace’, October 2, 2019), and Glenarm Castle, Co Antrim (2023 Historic Houses Garden of the Year), as well as in private gardens in both Ireland and Britain. She studied horticulture at RHS Wisley in Surrey, after Trinity College, Dublin, then worked for Arabella Lennox-Boyd before setting up her own practice, formally joining forces last year with her long-term collaborator Mark Lutyens, a landscape architect, to become Lutyens & FitzGerald.
Miss FitzGerald is the eldest of the three daughters of the 29th and last Knight of Glin and, together with her husband, the actor Dominic West, she has taken on Glin, which, today, is more of a castellated grand Georgian house than anything that could withstand an attack. Even when her parents, Desmond and Olda, were in charge and running the place as a smart boutique hotel, she was given pretty much a free rein in the garden. It was a generous gift to the nascent designer and one that she has been working on for 25 years.
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin August 07, 2024 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Giriş Yap
Bu hikaye Country Life UK dergisinin August 07, 2024 sayısından alınmıştır.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Giriş Yap
Happiness in small things
Putting life into perspective and forces of nature in farming
Colour vision
In an eye-baffling arrangement of geometric shapes, a sinister-looking clown and a little girl, Test Card F is one of television’s most enduring images, says Rob Crossan
'Without fever there is no creation'
Three of the top 10 operas performed worldwide are by the emotionally volatile Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, who died a century ago. Henrietta Bredin explains how his colourful life influenced his melodramatic plot lines
The colour revolution
Toxic, dull or fast-fading pigments had long made it tricky for artists to paint verdant scenes, but the 19th century ushered in a viridescent explosion of waterlili
Bullace for you
The distinction between plums, damsons and bullaces is sweetly subtle, boiling down to flavour and aesthetics, but don’t eat the stones, warns John Wright
Lights, camera, action!
Three remarkable country houses, two of which have links to the film industry, the other the setting for a top-class croquet tournament, are anything but ordinary
I was on fire for you, where did you go?
In Iceland, a land with no monks or monkeys, our correspondent attempts to master the art of fishing light’ for Salmo salar, by stroking the creases and dimples of the Midfjardara river like the features of a loved one
Bravery bevond belief
A teenager on his gap year who saved a boy and his father from being savaged by a crocodile is one of a host of heroic acts celebrated in a book to mark the 250th anniversary of the Royal Humane Society, says its author Rupert Uloth
Let's get to the bottom of this
Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply
Sing on, sweet bird
An essential component of our emotional relationship with the landscape, the mellifluous song of a thrush shapes the very foundation of human happiness, notes Mark Cocker, as he takes a closer look at this diverse family of birds
