Tales from Duck Island Cottage

One of the many things I have always loved about London is its ability to continually surprise you.  London's garden squares take after the city and are often astonishing finds.   Whe...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2017/06/a-triangle-of-tranquillity.html

Vestry House is one of our 31 new gardens for 2017 - opening for the very first time to the public on the Sunday.  Small but perfectly formed, it has been created on the site of the grav...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2017/05/where-have-all-graveyards-gone.html

I Bina Gardens East is a privately owned delight of a garden, hidden by houses and railings off the Old Brompton Road.  When you enter the garden you are greeted by a magnificent specim...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2017/04/three-gardeners-and-ice-cream-man.html

I visited Winterton House Organic Garden on a cold morning just after storm Doris had wreaked its destructive winds over London gardens.  A large shrub had been uprooted but although the ga...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2017/03/windy-times.html

In a week when judges seized the headlines not far away from this Temple hall, I contemplated the gardens lawyers can relax in on the banks of the Thames. The Temple Gardens at  Middle Tem...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2017/02/temples-by-thames.html

Sunlight filtering down through trees into a wooden glade in June.  Peaceful and idyllic.  Who would know that this picture is from a mature, natural wood, pretty much entirely surrounded ...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2017/01/a-hidden-gem-londons-smallest-secret.html

This was the active scene which greeted me when I visited the Stave Hill Ecological Park in Rotherhithe - volunteers performing a variety of essential roles under the guidance of Rebeka Clark...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/11/valuing-volunteers.html

Stephen Crisp has been Head Gardener at Winfield House since 1987. As Winfield House is the Official Residence of the Ambassador of the United States of America to the Court of St.James's, h...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/10/the-constant-gardener.html

The first time I saw an installation by Rebecca Louise Law, I stood, staring upwards for ages, transfixed by its beauty.  This time her artwork was the first exhibit in the newly establishe...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/09/everlasting-flowers-and-meadows.html

Walking along the Strand in London you might wonder what goes on behind the doors of the famous Coutts Bank.  A few lucky Open Garden Squares Weekend ticket holders had the chance to find ou...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-secret-world-of-banking.html

There were blackbirds nesting in the jasmine when I visited the bijou Highgate Day Centre garden.  I heard one swooping in and saw the jasmine shiver as its wings fluttered through the leav...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/07/blackbirds-nesting-in-jasmine.html

"My garden is too big for its boots" declared Edward Augustus Bowles who lived at, designed and planted Myddelton House Gardens in Enfield (1865 to 1954). He was right about its size. Spanning ei...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/06/a-garden-too-big-for-its-boots.html

Walking down to the bottom of Mare Street in Hackney, you could be forgiven if you missed the slip of land which is Cordwainers Garden. It's tucked down the side of what used to be Cordwainers Co...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/05/plants-to-dye-for.html

It was a sunny day in March that Kevin Powell, the Head Gardener of Park Crescent and Park Square Gardens, let me into his secret gardens, which border Regents Park.  The skies were blue but ...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/04/gardeners-who-make-our-souls-blossom.html

I felt the first stirrings of spring when I visited Cleveland Square at the end of February and sensed that shoots might soon be poking their heads through their thick winter blanket of compost....

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/03/waiting-for-spring.html

On the White City Estate growing vegetables and herbs involves all parts of the community - residents, school children, and restaurants.  And maybe it's that link with restaurants that has so s...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/02/communities-cooking.html

As if they weren't busy enough, Jackie Thompson and her dog Tilly, whom we featured last month, look after another secret garden in Hammersmith.  I went with them across the borough to the John ...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2016/01/open-glory.html

You could easily pass by Sycamore House in Hammersmith without any inkling of the garden delights created by the tenants inside.  Managed by Hammersmith United Charities, this is a modern almsh...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/12/havens-and-almshouses-winding-walk.html

There are not many schools with gardens as astonishing as the ones at Whitgift School.  And although the autumn sunshine we had been having deserted me on the day I visited, the new plantings in...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/11/an-astonishing-school-garden.html

"We are so remarkably airy! - Mr Wingfield thinks the vicinity of Brunswick Square decidedly the most favourable as to air." So spoke Isabella, the sister of Emma in Jane Austen's famous book of ...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/10/airs-and-squares.html

Maybe it's true that Sir Terry Farrell, designer of the MI6 building and Camden Lock's TV AM studios, painted the doors and windows of Wesley Square red because he found a bargain job lot of the ...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/09/painting-square-red.html

The Crossrail construction across London and the closure of Thameslink to Barbican left one platform at the station looking a bit forlorn. Marked by a couple of old terracotta pots, home to some ...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/08/planting-platforms.html

Open Garden Squares Weekend may be over a month ago but we have been looking at all your wonderful photos from the Weekend on Instagram. There are so many gardens and here at Duck Island we don�...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/07/through-instagrammers-eyes-and-lenses.html

Tucked away near Notting Hill are the backlands, green spaces of different kinds, created for the St Quintin Estate, built between 1880 and 1900.  One of the backlands has been a bowling club si...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/07/bowling-in-backlands.html

The film 'Notting Hill' captures a romantic London of the not-too-distant past and a beautiful, classical London garden square, Rosmead Garden, is the star of the show. There is a famous scene w...

http://talesfromdic.blogspot.com/2015/06/londons-little-villages.html