Thread by @ajcdeane

#Deanehistory 157. The Lost Gardens of Heligan. Hat tip SH.

Heligan was the country seat of the Trelawnys for four hundred years.

Buying the Heligan estate outside Mevagissey in Cornwall in the 16th century, they built a new manor house;

rebuilt in 1692, although handsome, it is not what we are interested in today.

Henry Hawkins Tremayne, a priest, began work on the gardens in the late 1700s. Thomas Gray was commissioned to create a plan and the gardens were laid out. Succeeding generations of Trelawnys continued his work, adding “The Jungle” with its subtropical plants

Ornamental trees and an avenue of Himalayan evergreen dogwood beside the drive came next. The gardens flourished. A crowning glory was the Italian garden. Species unknown to the British Isles arrived and flourished.

Requiring the ministrations of more than 20 full time gardeners, the Heligan gardens were immaculately maintained.

Then the Great War came.

The gardeners went to fight for their country. Most did not return.

Jack Trelawny, who had created the Italian garden, went the whole hog and moved after the war to Italy. He was the last of the Trelawnys to live at Heligan. He leased out the house (but, importantly for our purposes, NOT the gardens).

Like many old country houses around England during the Second World War, the house at Heligan was used by the Americans as a base, and in the atmosphere of planning, training, tension and conflict in that time it seems that no great hortological interest was in evidence.

After the war, the house was converted into flats and sold off piecemeal. Orphaned from the great home that had once meant their state was closely maintained, owned by an absent family, the gardens were not looked after– indeed, they fell into complete disrepair.

Grown over very quickly by foliage and weeds that completely obliterated the original, exquisite plans from view, the gardens were really no more.

Could they have talked, the jungle ferns – run riot across their patch and beyond,

providing coverage that would have pleased someone deliberately trying to hide the Trelawny genius, would probably have expressed great happiness about this state of affairs; anyone with a love of such places would have felt rather differently.

In short, the gardens were lost. Out of sight, out of mind indeed. For some 70 years they slumbered beneath the riotous overgrowth of foliage, along with the standard perils of an English garden gone wild – nettles, brambles, weeds; nature’s way of saying “I rule here: keep out!”

And largely people did. But not everyone.

Britain is, and is called, many things. Britain is a nation of shopkeepers – Napoleon’s famous dictum.

A nation of animal lovers – the first country to create welfare charities for animals.

But also Britain is a nation of gardeners.

Thus it was that seventy years after their abandonment, the huge gardens at Heligan began to see some love again. Jack Trelawny had died childless, the gardens passing in trust to members of the extended Trelawny family.

Led by one of them, John Willis, local gardening enthusiasts set to work – and what emerged astonished them.

The gardens were pretty much still there.

Yes, a trim was required. More than a trim. A huge amount of work, in fact - it is Europe’s largest garden restoration.

It has taken a decade and more.

But today the gardens have been restored to their glory. Walled gardens. The Jungle. The Italian garden. Ornamental gardens. Vegetable gardens. Winding walks and places to get lost in and all the rest.

The garden at Heligan had not forgotten, though its owners and neighbours had.

The lesson is saccharine, but one dear to the hearts of gardeners everywhere. With a little nurturing and effort and patience, long-vanished treasures can shine again.

I feel that this is a lesson applicable more widely than merely to gardening, too.