Bring a picnic and a blanket and bask with acclaimed historians, curators, gardeners and writers as they explore why our imaginations are compelled to the idyllic vision of the garden. Hampton Court Palace will mark the 300th anniversary of the birth of Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown, a designer who changed the national landscape and created a style which has shaped what we now know to be the quintessential English countryside by exploring gardens as a political statement and the working garden, including puzzling accounts of 18th century life in the kitchen garden.
Speakers
John Phibbs is an author and renowned garden historian with more than 30 years’ experience of planning and management of historic landscapes. He’s the leading authority on Capability Brown
Dr Oliver Cox is a historian at the University of Oxford. His research explores the political meanings of country houses and landscape architecture during the eighteenth century.
Graham Dillamore is a gardener and manages the vast gardens and estates at Hampton Court Palace and Kensington Palace.
Vicki Cooke is a gardener and horticulturalist with a passion for food production. Her interest in heritage crops and seed saving was formed at the Garden Organic’s Heritage Seed Library where for several years she grew traditional UK vegetable variety. In 2014 she began work on the recreation of William & Mary’s Kitchen garden at Hampton Court Palace.
£24/£22 Historic Royal Palaces members. Ticket price includes a drink and access to Hampton Court Palace and the gardens. For more details and to book a ticket, visit the Hampton Court Palace events page.
