Cranford author Mrs Gaskell's house and garden restored

With almost nothing left of the original garden, Manchester-based landscape architects Randall Thorp and garden historian Dr Ann Brooks dug through Victorian Ordnance Survey maps, academic studies, and Gaskell's works and letters in order to create a plan of how it might have looked and the plants it might have featured.

The research, says consultant Edward Thorp, revealed a garden of character, which reflected Gaskell's own loves and interests, and was different to other, more formal, villa gardens of the time.

"It was very much mixed and certainly not for show," says Mr Thorp, who has headed a team of volunteer gardeners. "It was a garden to be enjoyed."

At the time of moving, Gaskell wrote to her friend, Eliza Fox, that she believed the garden would be a "great delight". She added: "Clay soil it will be, and there is no help for it, but it will be gay and bright with common flowers; and is quite shut in - and one may get out without bonnet, which is a blessing."

In another letter, the keen gardener suggested farming was her "proper vocation", perhaps inspired by the time she spent as a child visiting her grandparents' farm in Sandlebridge, near Knutsford, in Cheshire. In Manchester, the Gaskells grew vegetables, churned their own butter and kept a pig and poultry in the garden, while their cow resided in a nearby field.

Now swallowed up by the city, Plymouth Grove is no longer a place for livestock, but the reconstructed garden features varieties of the vegetables, fruit and colourful flowers the Gaskells grew, from red-and-white camellias and mignonettes to peas and herbs, along with plants that reflect their life. Elizabeth was known to her family as 'Lily' so it is fitting the garden will include lily of the valley and martagon lilies, while visitors in spring should see a "host of golden daffodils" similar to those made famous by the poet William Wordsworth, who Gaskell met. Just as Charlotte Bront noted how "a whispering of leaves and perfume of flowers always pervaded the rooms" through the open windows in the summer of 1851, so the new garden has been designed with scent in mind.

The gardeners have paid careful attention to plant discoveries of the period but tracking down popular Victorian species has not always been easy. They have also "taken liberties" with one of Gaskell's favourite flowers, the rose, admits Mr Thorp, because Victorian species were often diseased and had a shorter flowering time. Instead, the garden features varieties including Rosa chinensis 'Old Blush' and Rosa rugosa 'Rubra', which he says, have similar characteristics but are healthier.

Perhaps the biggest challenge in bringing the historic garden back to life, however, has been adapting its original features to the current plot, which at 1,300sq m is half the size it was when Gaskell lived there. An area of garden to the side of the house had been sold off and developed with flats before the site came into the trust's ownership. The new design must also allow for modern considerations such as accessible parking and the need to keep lawns clear to allow for garden parties or weddings.

"It's trying to create the character of a larger garden in a smaller space and accommodate the cars and crowds," says Mr Thorp. "I hope it will reflect the things Gaskell enjoyed and valued in gardens: the nature of the plants, both flowering and edible, and a place for family enjoyment."

Elizabeth Gaskell's house opens to the public on Sunday, October 5. For more details visit elizabethgaskellhouse.co.uk

See more here:
Cranford author Mrs Gaskell's house and garden restored