Dutch Garden, Hampton Court Castle

In England the term "Dutch garden" often refers to a formal garden with water features where the space is used efficiently and the layout is essentially rectilinear with cut hedges and shrubs. They were characteristic of English country houses of the later seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, though many fell out of favour and didn't survive to the present day. This example at Hampton Court Gardens in Herefordshire is a reconstruction that captures some of the qualities of this type of garden.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Maze, Hampton Court Castle

The maze at Hampton Court Castle, Herefordshire, has a tower at its centre from the top of which you can survey people wending their way (or not) towards you. It also has a tunnel that leads from the base of the tower to the garden beyond the perimeter of the maze. This means that, having navigated your way to the centre of the maze you have no need to find your way out: a feature that I've never come across before. But then I haven't experience of more than half a dozen mazes.


photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100

Pavilion revisited

Seven years ago I photographed one of the two garden pavilions that form part of a water feature in the formal gardens of Hampton Court Castle in Herefordshire. On a recent return visit, accompanied by two of our grandchildren and their parents, I photographed the pavilion again, this time in brighter weather and including more of the surroundings which have now matured nicely.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Garden sculpture

This piece of garden sculpture appears to be one of two children responding to the beckoning flute of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The three metal sculptures are situated in an area of "meadow" in a garden at Hampton Court Castle in Herefordshire. The setting of long grass adds depth and mystery to the the pieces that placement on a manicured lawn could not.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10