RHS Round Up!

The RHS show was soon in full swing after a glorious spell of sunny weather, and Tatton’s garden team were in high spirits having been awarded a Silver Gilt for their entry ‘A flight of Fancy’.

Linking in with the Tatton Park Arts Biennial 2012, the imaginative concept behind the garden design is that the last Baron Egerton, who collected plants and garden styles from many continents, including the famous Japanese Garden, sent plant material to other countries, including pea and bean cultivators to his estate in Kenya. Combining  his passion for plants with his interests in exploration, early radio cars, and was a pioneer aviator it helped launch our concept for the 1930’s style rocket, landing on a desolate planet where 1000’s of seeds spill out onto the baron land and flourished into a mass of colour.

What went into the show...

The build took 2 weeks from start to finish, and much of the garden’s features were grown or recycled from Tatton’s own gardens including 3-4 tonnes of the rocks and boulders that make up the Moongate!

Since we started growing the plant species in early May we have nurtured them daily to ensure they are at their best for the show.

We have lots of varieties of plants and vegetables in the garden this year ...see if you can spot them! They include pineapple plants from Tatton’s very own Pineapple house! We also have bananas, cannas, runner beans and cucumbers – all from our conservatory, and palms from our fernery...

...We even have a small rock pool which represents life on the flourishing side of the garden.

Simon (far right) with Head gardener Simon Tetlow (centre) and Bob Buckley (far left)

By Simon Kellet, Garden Team member

If you visited the show this year we would love to hear your comments about your personal show highlights and your thoughts on Cheshire East’s exhibit by the Tatton Garden team.  Leave us your comments below!

For more info on Tatton Parks garden click here.

Hey there!

I'm Kat Robbins and I'm doing work experience here at Tatton Park in the Marketing Department. I'm currently at Nottingham Trent University studying Broadcast Journalism and in October I will be going into my third and final year. I have been at Tatton for just under a month and am thoroughly enjoying it! I have been editing the Tatton Times that is the three monthly staff magazine as well as writing press releases and designing the Christmas Leaflets and flyers. I am enjoying the marketing and PR side of Tatton and feel it will really boost my portfolio and give me a really valuable experience. 

And... this is me.

 (completely coincidental that I have Tatton Park behind me, Honest. Good to know it's being promoted in Alderley Edge too though eh?)

My favourite part of Tatton are the gardens and the Parklands, the Japanese Garden is my particular favourite part out of the gardens. I love the Japanese and oriental culture and I find the gardens very close to a real Japanese garden. I was very impressed with the knowledge the tour guides have when I went on the tour about a week ago, she was particularly thorough with cultural information. 

I would love to travel around the world and aim to go the year after next, after I have completed University. South East Asia will be my first point of call.

I can't quite get my head around the fact that a 'normal-ish' (apart from being completely wealthy) lived in this Mansion, I can't imagine walking around the rooms, shouting 'When's tea?' or calling to the dogs or cats outside in the gardens!

I took some photos when I went down to the farm last week, these are them! I'm rather partial to photography and love to take photos wherever I am of my favourite bits - of life - I guess!

Kat x

The return of a masterpiece to Tatton Park’s Collection by Caroline Schofield

For the Mansion Team the end of May brought with it the delivery of a very large packing case and a stressful but gratifying job! As you can imagine it isn’t every day that you move a great painting by the artist Van Dyck, but when the Mansion team welcomed his painting of The Martyrdom of St Stephen back to Tatton it was everyone to the ready. As you can imagine it isn’t every day that you move a great painting by the artist Van Dyck, but when the Mansion team welcomed his painting of The Martyrdom of St Stephen back to Tatton it was everyone to the ready. This internationally-important painting from the Tatton collection was being returned from a prestigious exhibition held at Dulwich Picture Gallery in London which ended on May 27.Iconic 17^th century painter Sir Anthony Van Dyck (1599 – 1641) left his native Antwerp in 1621 for Italy to study the work of earlier Italian painters Titian, Veronese and others.

 During his travels he painted the portraits of the wealthy and powerful, becoming something of a celebrity as an artist. In spring 1624 he reached Palermo in Sicily. Not long after his arrival Sicily was struck by a violent outbreak of plague, and until recently it was believed that he left for safety. The exhibition, ‘Van Dyck in Sicily: Painting and the Plague 1624-1625’  explored newly-found evidence that he in fact remained on the plague-stricken island, and during his time there produced major paintings along religious themes, such as his St Rosalia in Glory and the Tatton St Stephen.
Van Dyck biographer Robin Blake said ‘Whether created in the heat of the epidemic, or as ex voto offerings after it was over, the paintings played a major role in the imagined drama of their city’s deliverance’.

Strange to think then that a painting produced on a Mediterranean island by the great master of 17^th century art should be wending its way home to a 19^th century English country house. According to records, in 1793 its interesting journey had taken it to the Church of San Pascual Bailon in Madrid, after which it was sold and imported into England by the dealer William Buchanan.

In 1814, when he was busy furnishing his fine new mansion at Tatton, Wilbraham Egerton acquired it for his collection from the Delahante sale at Phillips Auction house on 3^rd June, at a cost of 700 guineas. Since that time it has graced the drawing room at Tatton with its sombre beauty. Safely back in position the painting, measuring six feet by five feet, took the strength of seven people to lift back into place on the silk lined walls. As you can imagine lifting something extremely heavy, fragile and important to hang against delicate silk, battened to the walls some 100 years ago is a ‘bottle tester’, but with the aid of art handlers and the team everything went without a hitch. 

It is always a great honour for Tatton to be asked to contribute to major exhibitions, not only does it allow us to share access to our collection, but it also highlights the quality of the objects in our care and gives Cheshire a plug. Bringing together Van Dyck’s Sicilian works was a fantastic achievement by curator Xavier Salomon at Dulwich, but we are very glad to have St Stephen back. If you want to come and see the painting please do. Our team will be happy to show it to you.

Caroline

Tatton's Medieval Fayre

The Old Hall comes to life with the sights and sounds of the 15th century....

It’s that time of year again when the Old Hall at Tatton turns into a Medieval Fayre, Encampment and Battleground...unfortunately a very muddy one particularly on saturday, but that didn’t dampen the spirits of anyone. Luckily most tents went up on friday before the torrential rain came and the grounds of the Old Hall were transformed into a riot of colour, flags and re-enactors.

It was surprisingly busy on saturday and just when the muster for the battle started the heavens opened but all the soldiers, knights and archers stood their ground and went out to the battlefield...and came back!

Sunday started with much better weather and the sun made everyone feel brighter too...A lot more visitors arrived and soon the grounds were packed with people wanting to see the tournament, falconry, demonstrations of guns, and the final battle outside on the flat ground. As always there was plenty to buy and have a go at, children’s activities in our Education tent, and tasty thing to eat and drink. The Old Hall itself was open and with guides to tell you all about its history and give you a feel of what it was like long ago.

Then came the muster for the battle again, it looked a bit threatening with some black clouds in the distance and as the intrepid archers went out into the field, including the elite few of the Tatton Archers, the weather seemed to clear. An exciting battle started, arrows flew over from both sides, the guns fired and smoke billowed across the field, a few injuries tended by the Red Cross (not so lucky in the original battles). There were lots of shouts and cheers of encouragement from the crowd and then it was all over and the victorious winners marched back to camp.

A great weekend enjoyed by all despite the British summer weather.

Margaret Clark

History Interpreter Guide

Tatton 365 - Mark Williamson

May 2012

Things are moving fast with Tatton 365. Spring has passed and Summer is now here, albeit not very convincingly. Life at Tatton is getting busier, with the events calendar in full flow now. All the behind the scenes work over the winter is paying off and the army of staff and volunteers have got the estate up to scratch.

Visually, everything is changing so quickly. The colours and tones are changing weekly as Spring turns to Summer and there have been new arrivals on a daily basis on both farm and estate. 

I have the constant frustration of not being able to spend as much time as I would like shooting the project, but that was always going to be the case. My visits are always extended by an hour or two. I think it's swiftly becoming an obsession. However, a healthy obsession and my back up hard drives are quickly filling up.

As the exhibition date in October moves ever nearer, the objective of documenting life at Tatton steps up a gear. 

More posts to follow…

Tatton 365



Mark Williamson Tatton Park ©



Hello, my name is Mark Williamson and I am currently shooting a photographic project on Tatton Park, called Tatton 365.

The aim of the project is to document all aspects of life at Tatton Park. My background is in advertising photography, so this project is a little bit of a departure for me, in the sense that most of my work is constructed photography, normally working to a very detailed brief. The only brief for the Tatton 365 project is self appointed, and is to present a detailed and personal insight into life at Tatton. I started shooting in the summer of 2011 and will finish around October of 2012, with some of the work going on display in the mansion from 6th October. Details are on the Tatton Park events listing webpage

I shall try to post monthly on the build up to the exhibition, with a few images thrown in to give a taste of some of the work.



Mark Williamson Tatton Park ©



So March is my first post and as the days get longer, life on the estate is getting busier. The gardens are starting to come to life, with the trees and shrubs packed with buds biding their time before they burst open. The farm is gradually welcoming new arrivals and lambing week is just around the corner. It's always hard driving through the estate at dawn, with the silhouettes of deer herds slowly emerging from the morning mist. The urge to take "just one more photo of the deer" is always hard to resist.



Mark Williamson Tatton Park ©



These events and hundreds more are just some of the sources of my inspiration for this project, and hopefully I will be able to convey my passion for this subject matter over the coming months.

Wonderland and the White Rabbit...

If you were in the Gardens at Tatton over the Easter Weekend you may have thought you were seeings things with a White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, Queen of Hearts and other slightly mad characters but it was of course quite real! well, I think it was...


The Queen of Hearts & White Rabbit

©Margaret Clark

  

Alice at tea

©Margaret Clark



The weather was a bit chilly but the Rabbit did tell me that at least the fur coat kept him cosy, and perhaps the way everyone was running about kept the rest of them warm too, along with the tea...you can’t have Alice in Wonderland without the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party.

The visitors joined in (with a bit of encouragement) with singing, dancing, juggling and anything else the children persuaded their parents to get up and perform!

It looked very busy in the Stableyard with a Magic Show, Punch and Judy and Hat Making...a quiz in the Mansion and a trail in the Gardens. Lots going on at the Farm too with storytelling with the Queen of Hearts and following the Cheshire Cat trail...not forgetting the main event with lots of new born lambs and chicks.

As well as the amazing characters and the madness of the Alice in Wonderland story, there was the real magic of all the plants and trees bursting into flower and blossom and new life with the baby animals...a proper Easter!

Margaret Clark, Interpreter Guide