HISTORIC GARDENS OF THE VALE OF GLAMORGAN

Think Welsh historic gardens and the among names that probably spring immediately to mind will be those north Wales giants Powis Castle and Bodnant. Think Glamorgan gardens and those names will be Duffryn and St Fagans. All these are `great' gardens, historically significant gardens; open to the public and with a plethora of guide books and leaflets to explain their history. But garden history, as this new book demonstrates, is not confined to the boundaries of great estates and the designs of wealthy landowners but extends right through the social scale to the poor man in his cottage.

This book explores the diverse garden history of the Vale of Glamorgan from the C 16th to the C2lst. It includes, as it must, Duffryn and St Fagans and other once great gardens such as St Donats Castle and Dunraven Castle. But here also are described gardens whose names will not be familiar, many of them in private ownership and not open to the public, but each with a fascinating history to tell. And in the pages of this book much of that history is told for the first time. There is the long and complex history of the Nash Manor garden which mirrors the history of the house; Merthyr Mawr house where the garden has changed little since its creation two hundred years ago; Craig-y-parc, Pentyrch, an Arts and Craft garden; and The Court, St Fagans where Gertrude Jekyll once advised the owners on planting schemes. The latter is now among the lost gardens of the Vale whose history and ultimate decline is traced; others in this sad category include The Ham and Dimlands, both in Llantwit Major. And there are the `sleeping' gardens at Llanmihangel Place where the original design is still preserved, and at Llantrithyd Place where a once magnificent garden lies buried and barely discernible beneath the ground.

Each contributor has described the gardens they have researched in a way that best reveals the individual character of each garden. Much of the content is the result of new research, and where already well-known gardens are described they are given a fresh image by the inclusion of illustrations which have rarely, and in some cases never, been seen `in public' before.

The book is published in hardback by the South and Mid Glamorgan Branch of the Welsh Historic Gardens Trust. It comprises 256 pages and includes some 250 illustrations, the majority of which are in colour. It has been edited by Hilary M. Thomas, a well-respected local historian with a wide range of publications to her name.

Historic Gardens of the Vale of Glamorgan will be on sale from 26 November at local booksellers in Barry, Cowbridge, Llantwit Major and Penarth. Price: £25.

Copies (Price £25 plus £4.95 p&p) can also be obtained direct from the publishers:

WHGT, Mwyndy House, Mwyndy, Llantrisant, CF72 8PN

(tel:01 443 227373; email: dan.claytonjones@talk2l.com)

Please make cheques payable to `Welsh Historic Gardens Trust