Research Garden DesignBrowse photos, get design ideas & see the hottest plants
British garden decorator Isabel and Julian Bannerman do n’t do things halfway . Their signature act is to create dreamyEnglish state gardensfilled with diachronic allusion : a globe of roses and downfall , formal allées and follies . They are n’t frighten off by unpromising website . On the Duke of Norfolk ’s estate in West Sussex , they built gateway and green - oak tree pavilions based on the lottery of Inigo Jones , Charles I ’s favorite architect , in a former parking lot . In the middle of a eggshell - lined grot , a golden crown rises on the waters of a natural spring and dances in midair . When it comes to theatricality , the Bannermans ca n’t serve piling it on .
Julian and Isabel Bannerman met in their 20s in the rollicking fine art scene of Edinburgh , Scotland . They have been together , personally and professionally , since . Their unreconstructed Bohemian expression belie their passion for the well - manicure gardens of England ’s historic acres and their clientele among England ’s social elites , from entertainers to the Prince of Wales . photograph by : Adrian Sherratt . SEE MORE OF THE BANNERMAN ‘S GARDENS
Like their garden , the Bannermans possess a peculiarly British mixture of grandeur , wit , and slightly tousled Bohemianism . Isabel ’s piercing downhearted eyes are framed by a tangle of pale blond hairsbreadth , which she often continue with a human being ’s wool fedora . Julian , 60 , is 10 year older , more opinionated , and comfortably cockle . Neither Bannerman prepares you to happen on their website the shibboleth “ Ich Dien , ” marking that they are by Appointment to the Prince of Wales , for whom they created a stumpery ( a Victorian confection in which gnarled tree trunks are stage in a picturesque tableau ) at Highgrove , Charles ’ home in Gloucestershire . More recently , they were on hand when Queen Elizabeth dedicate their memorial garden for the 67 British victims of 9/11 in Hanover Square in lower Manhattan .
The Bannermans have start to stretch along their usual idiom of the with child area garden . late projects include a low - primal bungalow garden in Wiltshire for Caryn Mandabach , the American producer of Showtime’sNurse Jackie , and a courtyard for 5 Hertford Street , a new private club in London ’s Mayfair . The 9/11 garden features a humbled , snaking rampart that roughly marks the shape of Britain and is uncharacteristically contemporaneous . “ That ’s what was call for in the context , ” says Isabel .
A scene in early summer past the formal water supply characteristic to the Pyrus communis orchard at Wychwood Manor , a garden the Bannermans designed in Oxfordshire , England . The pea plant gravel path , foreground , is softened by herbaceous plantings . exposure by : Mick Hales . SEE MORE OF THE BANNERMAN ‘S GARDENS
Isabel and Julian met in Edinburgh in the early 1980s , where she was studying history at the university and he was work in contemporary artwork . The dwelling of an outside arts fete , Scotland ’s majuscule has long been a thriving cultural shopping centre . The youthful duet could have put their energy into architecture or theatrical design , says Isabel . Instead , they move to west England and began design garden and garden buildings . In 1990 , the current Lord Rothschild gave them their first major commission , asking them to project a water garden and grotto at Waddesdon Manor , his sept ’s 19th - hundred country house . They ended up convert the dairy farm , once a showplace for the Rothschild oxen aggregation , into a conference center .
Their work come through Civic Trust and Europa Nostra awards and vaulted them to their country ’s high spheres . They have contrive gardens for England ’s dandy and proficient of every stripe , from Andrew Lloyd Webber to the Marquess of Cholmondeley to John Paul Getty II .
achiever has not quieted the couple ’s fidgetiness ; they have an appetence for exploration in and outside of landscape design . In December , the Park Walk Gallery present the first London show of Isabel ’s picture . The expectant - shell pictures — most are 3 by 5 feet — of individual plants taken at penny-pinching range include a crumpled silky flower of a poppy as enceinte as a human head and a peony pistil the size of a squirrel . With some of the flowers dissected or petal slay , the results are spookily erotic , almost anatomical in their item . They straddle a line between Victorian botanic specimens and contemporary generalisation . [ See ourslide show of Isabel Bannerman ’s pic . ]
The stick in terrace garden outside the sitting room at Wychwood Manor is circumvent by a yew hedge with a door the Bannermans designed . The door is made from green oak , a wood that can be chip at and handle to resemble more high-priced stone . Photo by : Adrian Sherratt . SEE MORE OF THE BANNERMAN ‘S GARDENS
Her move into picture taking “ was accidental , really , ” suppose Isabel . “ I had always taken pictures of the garden at Hanham Court [ the seven - bedroom gabled house in southwest England where the Bannermans raised their Word , Ismay , Rex , and Bertie ] , but they were unsatisfactory . I could n’t quite capture its spirit . ” She lead off experimenting with close - ups , shooting plant in a box line with black velvet to provide the complete indifferent background .
The photographs represent a bass bow to Karl Blossfeldt , the early twentieth - 100 lensman whose graphic , almost architectural film of plants they call up . “ These pictures get right in there to the plant world , ” says Isabel . “ They are more like it is , the texture and the coloring material that you experience in the garden . ”
Now Isabel and Julian are travel into novel projects . Four months ago the Bannermans sold Hanham Court and the beautiful garden they made there to take a 20 - year lease on Trematon , a Georgian - geological era house far to the Confederate States and Benjamin West in Cornwall . Owned by the Prince of Wales ( he is also Duke of Cornwall ) , it comes complete with its own twelfth - century palace in the nine - Akko ground . “ The gardens are cry out to be done , ” says Isabel . They are already planning to have them ready for private garden tours in 2013 , but what they will do with their new canvas tent is anyone ’s guess . Though they continue to refer in their gardens to Renaissance Britain and Italy , “ we do n’t do it for nostalgic reasons , ” read Isabel . “ It ’s all about undecomposed design , which our civilization has provide over hundreds of years . ”
The copious history of British gardens and state abode , in other words , is no restriction but a licence to invent . At the Duke of Norfolk ’s estate , the seaboard localisation and the inspiration of its earlier master , Thomas Howard ( known as “ the Collector ” ) , tolerate them to plant palms , bamboos , and tropic species “ to make it unknown and otherworldly , ” says Isabel , suit the memory of an earl interested in collecting oddities . The ancient computer architecture guides the plantings but does n’t determine their choice . “ The edifice give you something to drop anchor the plant life to , and the plants soften the building , ” she sound out . “ They really assist each other . ”
This sounds much like the duo ’s human relationship when it comes to plan a garden . Having work together for nearly 30 eld , theirs is a symbiotic partnership . “ It does n’t really separate up , ” says Isabel . “ We both retrieve in the same agency . ”
This clause was release in our April 2012 issue as " innate Phenomena . "
Caroline Donald is an editor program atThe Sunday Timesof London .
