An Array of Colour at Arundel Castle.
In the castle Rose Garden we have a wonderful array of roses planted for their colour, scent and structures giving everyone a good idea of different varieties, looking for a shrub, climber or standard rose. This garden is enhanced by the dramatic backdrop of the ancient castle, which is reflected by the gothic archways and seats designed especially to blend aesthetically with the castle’s gothic windows. This year we have added an additional gothic gate that leads one into a new woodland path which ends with the scent of our ‘Harlow Carr’ rose hedging.
For a powerful scent we have the beautiful old fashioned ‘Mme Isaac Pereire’ with crimson cup shaped flowers and in contrast the very tranquil white ‘Winchester Cathedral shrub rose with well-shaped, bushy growth and nice foliage, it also looks good just about anywhere, it’s particularly beautiful in a mixed border mingling with other plants and perennials.
We have planted standard ‘Munstead Wood’ roses, the flowers start off light crimson in the bud but, as the centre gradually reveals itself, it becomes a very deep velvety crimson while the outer petals remain rather lighter in colour, these roses stand proud above the white Winchester Cathedral rose to give a colour contrast.
A pretty climbing rose is ‘Adelaide d’Orléans’ which clambers across the rose archways with small pink buds that open to beautiful semi-double flowers, that quickly fade from creamy pink to creamy white and look stunning. We have also planted ‘St. Swithans’, ‘Generous Gardener’, ‘Tess of the d’Urbervilles’, ’ Gertrude Jekyll’, ‘Rosa Blanc Double de Courbert’ and ‘A Shropshire Lad’ within the Rose Garden.
In the Walled Gardens, within the Cut Flower garden, we have a special display of roses, mostly named after well-known gardeners and nurserymen such as ‘Graham Thomas’, ‘Geoff Hamilton’, ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ and ‘Alan Titchmarsh’. We have filled our tepees with lovely scented ‘Sweet Peas’ which our volunteers pick constantly, the more they’re picked the more they flower!
History of Roses: Here in England the rose is most recently associated in sport as the emblem for England and is in fact the national flower for Britain. Roses have an extensive history, going back literally millions of years with fossil evidence recorded; they feature in just about all nations across the globe in one way or another, in Roman & Greek in mythology, or as a highly decorative emblem in Asia. Here in Britain the rose became significant during the 'Wars of the Roses', 1455 to 1485 with the house of Lancaster represented by the red rose, who fought against the house of York represented by the white rose, hence producing the Tudor Rose seen so often in stain glass windows, paintings, carvings and our stately homes here in Britain. There are some excellent books and articles produced on just how significant the rose is in Britain and throughout the world today.
A selection of dazzling & highly scented lilies adorn the stunning gardens, with varieties including African Queen’, ‘Claude Shride’, ‘Forever Susan’, ‘Steel’ and ‘Tigrens’ transporting visitors to more tropical climes, punctuated by the large leaves of our Abyssinian red bananas ‘Ensete Ventricosum’.
The organic kitchen garden is looking wonderful, having just been planted up with a wide range of seasonal vegetables and with delicious fruit ripening, such as strawberries and raspberries.
A few tips from the castle garden team:
- Deadheading is essential at this time of year, especially with roses, as it encourages the plants to produce new flowers.
- Continue to mow your lawns weekly.
- Lupins and Sweet Peas flowers can be kept going for an extra 6 weeks by deadheading continuously, although the flowers will reduce in size they will give a great display through most of the summer months.
- Remove tomato side shoots
- Last chance to fill in the gaps in your borders with bedding plants.
Happy Gardening!
