The Cottage Garden Society - 25th Years On
PAT TAYLOR
Given its beginnings, who would have believed 25 years ago that The Cottage Garden Society
would survive - let alone flourish to celebrate its Silver Jubilee? Its founder members didn’t look
for sponsorship or any kind of help from the RHS. They made no approach to any distinguished
public figure or gardening celebrity to be patron of their new society. None of them were
professional botanists or nursery owners or landscape designers. They were just a handful of
keen gardeners in North Wales who loved old fashioned flowers and cottage gardens - at a time
when the buzz words were hard landscaping, and ease of maintenance. Older species and
varieties of garden plants were fast disappearing and cottage gardens were about as fashionable as
outside privies! However, their gut feeling was that there were plenty of people around like them
and on the 20th of June 1982, they held an inaugural meeting of the Cottage Garden Society
where nine of the people present agreed to form a caretaker committee until the First General
Meeting.
The founder members specified their aims as:
Firstly: to encourage and promote interest in cottage gardens, both past and present
Secondly: to further the use of those plants associated with cottage gardens, with particular
emphasis on the species (rather than new large-bloomed cultivars).
Thirdly: to assist those wishing to create or maintain such gardens.
One Sunday paper and several local ones published details of the new society. It received an
enthusiastic endorsement from an up-and-coming gardener who wrote a column in Practical
Gardening. His name was Geoff Hamilton. Gardening journalist, Pat Collison also wrote
favourably about the society in her “Gardener’s Diary” which had a large following in the
magazine, Popular Gardening. The Honorary Secretary, Doris Stephenson, (or Mike as she was
known) used her persuasive skills and energy to drum up support from gardeners and nursery
owners who were known to be sympathetic to the cause, and it was she who edited and produced
our first newsletter, two double-sided sheets of cyclostyled foolscap paper, the forerunner of
today’s enjoyable and highly respected magazine, The Cottage Gardener, edited so ably by Jill
Bennett.
When the First General Meeting was held on the 25th of September, 1982, the membership had
grown to 233. Pat Collison was elected as CGS President and would remain so for the next 13
years. Pat is a huge source of garden wisdom and she has contributed to almost every issue of the
magazine since the beginning. She cannot be with us today but I would like to thank her for
inspiring us over the years. I, personally, have learnt a great deal from her articles.
It was around this time that Douglas and I joined the Society. We found ourselves in August
1982, the owners of an old cottage in need of renovation with an abandoned garden littered with
broken quarry tiles, builders’ waste, and even mangled iron bedsteads, where the gorse and
nettles concealed all but the crowns of a group of old apple trees. While the builders worked
inside, Douglas and I started clearing the ground. Knowing nothing about cottage gardening, I
became a voracious reader of gardening books and turned to Margery Fish for inspiration,
particularly, We Made a Garden and, my favourite bedside reading, A Flower for Every Day.
Then on one of our numerous outings to nurseries, I heard of the CGS, whose aims seemed tailor1
made (excuse the pun) for us. I sent off the subscription at once, but nothing happened. Two
months went by and I had almost given up hope when the membership finally arrived. I only
found out the reason for the delay much later. Apparently, there had been teething troubles in the
infant society, personality clashes, which nearly scuppered it. Our first Chairman, Ian Graham,
together with a few members of the Committee had resigned. And its remaining members were
struggling. However, the Society survived under the chairmanship of Alan Carr, with Clive
Lane as Vice Chairman, Mike as Secretary and Alan’s wife, Philippa, as Membership Secretary.
Rosemary Verey once wrote that joining The Cottage Garden Society was a red letter day for her
and it was the same for me. Through the Society, in those early days, we were introduced to some
very special cottage gardens, hidden gems with knowledgeable - and generous owners. Most of
them and their gardens are gone now, but some of you may remember Oak Cottage in Shropshire,
owned by Ruth Thomson, venue of the Society’s first National Visit. Further afield was Herbert
Exton’s garden at Sunny Cottage, in Lincolnshire. Rosemary Verey was so enchanted by this old
countryman and his garden that Sunny Cottage was one of the gardens featured in her book,
Secret Gardens, as was another garden belonging to a Suffolk member, Kate Sorrell. We
recommended Leslie Holmes’ Camp Cottage in Gloucestershire to Geoff Hamilton who thought
this was the best cottage garden he had seen and he featured it on Gardener’s World. We feasted
our eyes and emptied our pockets at Bell Cottage where Susan Farquhar grew rare pinks. And at
Belmont House in the grounds of Tyntesfield House in Somerset, we saw a magnificent
collection of perennial asters and michaelmas daisies, built up over many years by the Misses
Allen and Huish, legendary growers whose catalogue listed 240 cultivars. Then there was
Margery Fish’s garden in Somerset where we spent an idyllic summer’s day, with the local W.I.
on hand to provide lunches and cream teas. These are visits that remain in the memory and some
of the plants I brought back from these outings are still in my garden.
But most of all I think the pleasure for me and for many others has been the friendships made
with fellow gardeners. At Oak Cottage, I first met Clive, Mike, and Anne and Ray Hamblin.
Anne brought with her trays of plants she had grown from seed to give to each of us. I remember,
too, her delicious and powerful elderflower wine! Inevitably, Douglas and I were roped in to help
stuff the envelopes for the newsletter at Alan and Philippa Carr’s dining table, and later at our
own. However, when the membership reached 4000, Douglas called a halt to what was now a 3day event and a distributor took over the packing and posting!
Nor did the Society forget its aim to further the plants associated with cottage gardens. A number
of old, named pinks were rescued from near extinction, as well as several double-flowered
primroses and double-flowered wallflowers. These and many other endangered plants were
distributed to members through our Plant Bank run by Clive during the eighties. I remember
acquiring a double bramble and double bindweed as well as a lovely double nasturtium!
As well as introducing old cottage garden favourites to members, we have also been able to
introduce two completely new plants to the gardening world. At our first national plant sale at
Betley, Cheshire in 1988, three plants of Anthriscus sylvestris ‘Ravenswing’, a most beautiful
black-leaved cow parsley, were donated for sale by a Derbyshire member. The plant had been
discovered in a hedgerow near Reading by Dr John Richards and this was the first public
appearance of ‘Ravenswing’. As this plant comes easily from seed it was quickly distributed to
members. Later, at the Society’s 1992 Plant Sale at Taunton in Somerset, a white-flowered form
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of the wild flower, Centaurea scabiosa with finely cut, lacy, chalky white flowers with a reddishpurple centre was introduced by a Dorset member, Mrs Janet Johnson. This plant, too, was found
in a hedgerow- actually a lay-by and was named by Janet Centaurea scabiosa alba ‘Cottage
Garden’.
The big leap in membership came in 1986 as a result of the Stoke Garden Festival. Two years
earlier, the Society had been approached by the National Garden Festival Committee to create a
cottage garden for this, the Second National Garden Festival. We expected we would be asked to
provide a bed or a border of cottage garden plants and instead were utterly shocked to find that
we were being asked to create a complete cottage garden surrounding a thatched cottage, to be
sponsored by Woman’s Weekly Magazine. Without ever having done an exhibition garden and
with no idea of the enormous undertaking we were signing up for, we accepted the challenge.
Fortunately for us, one of our members was Stephen Crisp, at that time head gardener at Leeds
Castle in Kent, now the American Ambassador’s head gardener. Stephen undertook the design of
the garden, commuting regularly from Kent to supervise the work. Clive was the mastermind
who organised every aspect of the project. Members volunteered their services; a whiff of dung
announced the arrival of Cliff and Sadie Halsall with a trailer load of manure from North Wales,
Cliff became master of the perfect vegetable garden and had us all painting the unappealing red
brick walls surrounding the cottage with a mixture of manure and milk. We all smelt a bit iffy
that day. Anne Hamblin grew all the bulbs in pots and the rest of us planted and weeded on a
weekly rota. We worked hard but we had a ‘lotta laughs’ at the same time.
The weather was particularly foul when we started planting and our site was more bog than
garden plot. Several of us were digging a pit into which we were to lever a fully grown, gnarled
old apple tree when Anne, who was a very big lady then, lost her balance, slid into the waterfilled hole and sank deep into the mud. It took the efforts of several of us (and much hilarity) to
pull her out, minus her boots, which had filled with muddy water. Our garden won a gold medal
and best theme garden in the Show.
The huge success of the Stoke Garden catapulted the Society into a different league and our
membership grew exponentially. Pat Collison had compiled leaflets about various aspects of the
cottage garden and, tired of responding to the increasing number of requests for them, she gave
them to me and I decided to expand them and make them into a booklet, which is how The
Cottage Garden Planner came about. It was the subject of an article by Graham Rose in the
Sunday Times and in the first three days I received 1400 requests for it. We had printed only a
thousand copies and had to make a rush order for another 2000. The success of the Society could
be measured in the response to this booklet, and many people who bought the Planner also joined
the Society. There were hundreds of letters from all sorts of people; from an air-vice-marshal and
a member of the House of Lords, to a prisoner in a Dutch prison who was planning the cottage
garden he would make when he was released. I hope he wasn’t planning a hemp patch.
It became clear that the Society would have to be run on a more professional basis if we were to
cope with the demands of this large and growing membership. Following the resignation of Alan
Carr, Douglas Taylor agreed to be Chairman and with his extensive business experience he was
able to steer the Society through the tricky period of introducing payments for committee
officers, who until now, had coped with an increasing burden of work on an entirely voluntary
basis. Joan Peel, an accountant by profession, became our Treasurer, and together, she and
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Douglas put the Society on a sound financial basis. It was agreed by the Committee that Clive
Lane would leave the committee to become the Society’s administrator and the Society’s
business and membership would be operated from Clive’s business premises in Crewe, the venue
for our Committee meetings for a number of years until Clive’s retirement.
World wide interest in the Society resulted in an influx of overseas visitors. Several groups of
members from the USA visited CGS members’ gardens in the UK and were given a warm
welcome. In addition, our funds were, for a time, greatly increased by the popularity of cottage
gardens amongst the Japanese for whom a cottage garden was something of a status symbol. In
1994, we were asked by a large Japanese china manufacturer to sponsor a series of teapots and
herb dishes which were to be sold in Japan at what seemed an extremely high price. We enjoyed
substantial royalties for some years from these products until an economic crisis hit Japan, sales
plummeted and eventually the products were withdrawn.
In 1990, we exhibited in the courtyard garden section at Chelsea and won a Silver Gilt Medal.
We exhibited in the Pavilion the following year and again were awarded silver gilt. That same
year (I was now editor of the magazine), David & Charles asked me if I would submit a proposal
for a book on cottage gardening. It seemed to me that Clive, with his unrivalled knowledge of
plants would be the best person to be the main writer and we approached Pat Collison to
introduce each season. I edited the book and wrote the bits that nobody else wanted to do. A
photographic competition amongst the members provided the pictures used in the book. A
photograph taken by the late Ruth Duthie won first prize and was used for the cover of the book.
And that is how the Cottage Gardener’s Companion came about. It eventually went out of print
and Jill Bennett, by now the magazine editor, saw to it that we bought back the rights and
supervised the reprinting of the book. Its style may be a little out-dated in these days of lavish
photographs but its content is as good as ever. As a result of that book, which was published in
1993, Clive was asked to write Cottage Garden Annuals, published in 1997, and his latest book,
Plants for Small Spaces was published in 2005.
By 1992, the year of our 10th anniversary, the Cottage Garden Society was flourishing with many
local groups. Dina Penrose, who became Chairman after Douglas retired, founded the West
Midlands Group and also by this time had taken over the Shows from Chris and Dave
Hampton. The Shows, as you know have been a huge undertaking and thanks to Dina and her
husband Patrick, we have had a presence at all the major shows with the help of local groups in
the area. While we are talking of Groups, I would also like to mention Pat Mansey who as well
as being a committee member for some years (in spite of the long haul to Crewe in the days when
there was no A14) also founded and, until very recently, successfully ran the large and
flourishing Norfolk Group. Pat’s was one of the gardens featured by Geoff Hamilton and the
venue for a National Garden visit. Of course, she has also contributed her articles and drawings
regularly to the magazine.
Geoff Hamilton had always shown an interest in the Society and we were delighted when in
1995, he agreed to take over from Pat Collison as our President. He had spoken at a very
successful 10th Anniversary AGM in Oxford in 1992, and attended our AGM at Pershore as our
President. His unexpected death in 1996 was a great loss to his many friends and admirers, and to
the Society.
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As the Society grew, we decided to make a feature of our AGM day and it was here that Trevor
Wall and Bob Windsor first made their mark, initially by holding a splendid national plant sale
in Derbyshire where there was a very strong group and then running the events at the AGM.
Trevor joined the Committee and became Secretary before succeeding Dina as Chairman, with
Bob as secretary. I would also like to mention very briefly the Seed Exchange. At first Anne
Hamblin and her late husband Ray handled every aspect of this from their spare bedroom - except
for putting together and computerising the final list of seeds. However, with increased
membership, the whole operation became too much for one household to handle. Anne continued
to receive the seeds, the Committee packed them, and Douglas, through the kindness of the
Grosvenor Estates (we live next door, in a manner of speaking, to the Duke of Westminster!)
arranged for the seeds to be handled in their visitor centre, which was unused during the winter
months. There, a posse of volunteers packed the seed orders and Douglas handled the daily
posting. However, the pool of volunteers in the Chester area was small and eventually the much
larger Severnside Group took over the distribution of the seeds with great professionalism, while
the Cheshire group undertook the filling of the seed packets with equal efficiency. Jill Bennett,
now editor of the magazine, took on the task of compiling and editing the seed list.
Each of the people I have mentioned here have played a major part in the development of the
Society but there are many more who have contributed in different ways and whom it has not
been possible to name today. However, there are two people who made an outstanding
contribution from the very beginning and I would like to pay tribute to them. The first is the late
Doris Stephenson, the guiding spirit in our earliest days, and the other is Clive Lane who has
always had the interests of the Society at heart, who has been its best ambassador over the years
and who, I hope will continue for a long time to play a part in this Society’s bright future.
[This talk was given by Pat Taylor at the CGS 25th anniversary AGM on 23rd June 2007 at
Hatton Court Hotel, to approx 120 members.]
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