Final floral fling for the painted meadow

It was the last haircut for the paths through the painted meadow this morning (group visits by appointement) and also for the lawns in the front of the walled garden.

These lawns are important because they are the public face from the bridge, so despite not being open to the public on a daily basis, the accurate clipping of the topiary Greater Crested Iford Fantailed Chickens (!) and some neat lines through the lawn are essential for a good first impression.

Earwig-oh, earwig-oh, earwig-oh...

Just a question really...

Has anyone else suddenly had the most enormous hatching of earwigs?  There's one small area of corridor in the house which has seemingly, and suddenly, become the mating ground for all Forficula auricularia.  


They all came out last night, and are now littering the flagstones.  Any thoughts?

Better-than-sticky 'fate' for Susan's jam in village competition

Excited news from the Westwood village fête last weekend.

Susan, Iford's Housekeeper who runs the tearoom over the summer, entered a pot of her increasingly popular Strawberry Jam, made using Iford's own strawberries grown in the kitchen garden, and enjoyed by many with their fresh scones and local clotted cream.

To everyone's delight, Susan won the jam prize.  So now we can proudly say that Iford's cream teas come with "award winning jam!".  Top stuff; well done Susan!

Here's a [rather grainy - sorry] photo of the jam's proud creator, holding court at the tearoom window.  Perhaps if there's a demand, some little jars of the stuff will appear next year.  Who knows?

Late summer and mellow fruitfulness

A warm balmy afternoon greeted those that ventured out today to visit us after a week of solid rain.  Pity the farmers trying to get their crops in (fortunately our barley was taken off before the rains came), nevertheless gardeners and their gardens will be breathing a sigh of relief at the return of decent levels of ground water.  Everything has greened up for a final late summer flourish.

I love this time of year as the literal fruits of one's labour are available straight from the tree or vine.  Tonight we were excited to discover a heavy crop of ripe figs in the kitchen garden.  It's an old tree, which may even pre-date Harold Peto's arrival in Iford (i.e. pre-1899), yet every year it produces a prolific crop of brown turkey figs, although rarely do we have enough sun to ripen so many of them.  This evening, I roasted them with balsamic vinegar and honey, and a pinch of ginger & cinnamon.  Satisfyingly fresh, simple food.

And so here are some photographs to delight and entice, taken this very evening around 7.15pm.

Photo shoot

Last week we were privileged to host the crew shooting for a future issue of an august knitwear publication, in and around the garden.  It is always a marvel to me how the fashion shoots manage to be so lucky with the weather at Iford.  Despite the day before having been depressingly drizzly and grey, they managed to arrive on the one day last week when we had patchy (but dry!) sunshine all day.

Though I am certainly not their target market, even to a woolly-Luddite like me it was clear that the knitted garments which they brought with them (to clothe statues and models in appropriate poses) were utterly gorgeous.

Such fashion shoots are important to Iford because they contribute not only to the wider use of the garden in general but also provide important revenue to enable us to continue with the maintenance and restoration of the garden.  But there are definitely shoots and shoots... some are assiduously sympathetic to the place and take infinite care not to damage the property - others, sadly, are less so.  Last week's crew was, thankfully, firmly in the former group, and it was a complete pleasure to host them.

If you would like to use Iford as a location, please contact our agents: Sarah Eastel Locations

Round 6 of the Maxxis Motocross

Farleigh Castle circuit, at the other end of the Iford estate from the manor, hosted Round 6 of this year's Maxxis British MotoCross Championship.  Seen amongst 'aficionados' as one of the great natural tracks (the track has been in annual use since 1936, so it's something of a grandfather in the sporting heirarchy!), old-school riding styles were required to negotiate the challenging terrain, bumps and steep terraces.

A report here from This is Somerset
and here from the official MXGB site

Judging by their attire, a few of the large crowd that attended the weekend event from all over the UK and Europe also took the time to walk over to the tearoom at Iford along the riverside footpath, where they found, hopefully to their satisfaction, something of a contrast from the petrol fuelled excitement at Farleigh!

A highly successful end to the main music season

Last Saturday saw the final Jazz Promenade of the season, and thankfully the weather turned out to be [relatively] kind, although it was threatening.  The morning and afternoon brought consistent showers, which sent worried shivers through the set-up team, contemplating with horror a return to last year's quagmire-car parks, sodden lawns and slippery steps.

The sodden sweet peas may have looked pretty, but picnic brollies were an essential upon arrival:

As usual, though, we confirmed the weather in its better behaviour by putting up more and more tents!

By about 7.30pm, just in time for the music, you wouldn't have known it was the same day from the photographs.

The 'macintosh'-clad audience was treated first to some wonderfully intimate Flamenco in the cloister where Eclipse held a capacity audience entranced by their beguiling Spanish dance.  By the end of their set, there wasn't a cloud in the sky over the Casita, which provided a complete contrast with revved up Cuban rhythms from the masterful Mojito, encouraging much revelry.  A fuller report will no doubt follow with photographs from the team at Iford Arts.

From our perspective, as the venue itself, we were particularly pleased that each of the bands expressed themselves very happy with the space in which they performed; this really is as important as anything to us - happy musicians = happy audiences!

Well done to Iford Arts and their volunteers on organising another great night and a fantastic season of events.

(Performance photos to follow.)