Growing the Mount Stuart garden: Three hundred years from first planting

Three hundred years ago the Mount Stuart Gardens were nothing more than 300 acres of scrub and woodland stretching down toward the Firth of Clyde. In the years since, Mount Stuart’s gardeners have worked tirelessly to transform these 300 acres into what Historic Scotland’s Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes describes as “One of Scotland’s most notable designed landscapes that is outstanding in many ways”.

In the spring of the year 1717, a team of gardeners broke ground to lay out the formal parterre and the avenues around the main house followed shortly afterwards by the planting of the first exotic strawberry trees along the Mount’s cliff edge.

In the years since, Mount Stuart’s approach has always been to create ‘wow factor’ which has continued in a similar vein through the generations from the 3rd Earl of Bute playing a key role in the establishment of Kew Gardens and the production of his own botanical tables to Charlotte Windsor (in 1798), wife of the 1st Marquess, introducing the first dahlias to the British Isles.  Maria North, wife of the 2nd Marquess, laid out the Wee Garden in 1823-24. Today a number of plants have survived from the original collection including Cork Oak, The Silk-Tassel Bush and the Chilean Lantern which is the largest in existence within Scotland.

Throughout their history, the landscapes have been influenced by many notable designers from Thomas Mawson to most recently Rosemary Verey and James Alexander-Sinclair.

Since being open to the public in 1995 more than a million people have visited this unique garden off Scotland’s west coast (close to Glasgow). As well as the glorious gardens and grounds, visitors are drawn to the magnificent neo-gothic house, extensive art collections and their coastal location. It is established as a national visitor destination, a place which creates gardens, exhibitions, events, experiences and projects that connect people, art, land and learning.

Mount Stuart is a Glorious Garden:

• Mount Stuart is an extraordinary 18th century garden. It is one of the most significant gardens in Europe and one of the UK’s many ‘Great Gardens.’
• Mount Stuart’s iconic Neo-gothic style house, gardens and art exhibitions are key visitor drivers. Many of our visitors don’t explore the gardens and estate so miss a key part of the Mount Stuart experience. Meanwhile, we would like to attract more traditional garden visitors who may not have thought Mount Stuart was a place for them.
• We plan a series of projects to attract visitors into the Gardens and encourage exploration of the whole of Mount Stuart. With a parallel programme to develop exhibits, we will highlight the garden’s unique stories as well as its horticultural attractiveness and significance.
• Projects also aim to capitalize on the Pavilion Conservatory, historic collections and new developments.
• The Gardens are being divided into zones to assist with orientation and provoke curiosity and a sense of adventure.

 Growing Mount Stuart

As with all gardens, though, the job is never finished. With the 300th anniversary year of the first plantings, Mount Stuart has set itself new challenges in 2017: to attract more people to the wider reaches of its gardens and draw in more traditional garden visitors.  To achieve this it is launching “Growing Mount Stuart”, a series of projects to provide visitors with fresh interest and stimulate new audiences.

Among the plans are:

Re-defining Scotland’s most notable designed landscapes: restoration and reinvigoration of the gardens with initial proving works is underway. The next significant phase is to move the gardens towards a garden master planning phase.

Rock Garden Restoration:  with recent funding from the Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust the restoration of the Rock Garden is underway in 2017 with remedial works. 

Golden Heart of Mount Stuart:  The dramatic shapes and forms of the planting provide a backdrop to a wide range of planned events during 2017 including the ‘Art of Power; Masterpieces from the Bute Collection’ collaboration with Glasgow University’s Hunterian Museum and this year’s Visual Arts programme. Mount Stuart has over a million daffodil bulbs and in autumn 2017 the team will be planting hundreds of thousands more, focusing on native species and historic cultivars planted between 1717 and the 1970’s.

Giants of Bute: Following a visit by the Tree Register of Britain and Ireland (the official body for recording champion and notable trees), Mount Stuart is delighted to have 80 Champion Trees recorded. To look after these “Giants of Bute” Mount Stuart Trust is developing a relationship with Bartlett Tree Experts to survey the champions and plan out a maintenance regime to increase their vigour and retain healthy growth.

Editors Notes:

Mount Stuart is without doubt an extraordinary architectural extravagance. A Neo-Gothic country house, it was built from 1880 for the 3rd Marquess of Bute, who is regarded as the greatest architectural patron of the Victorian age. Mount Stuart house is located in extensive grounds on the island of Bute off the west coast of Scotland.

The significant Designed Landscape at Mount Stuart constitutes some 670 Acres (283Ha) is described within Historic Scotland’s Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes as “one of Scotland’s most notable designed landscape that is outstanding in many ways”.

For further comments and information please contact Don Murray Head of Landscapes & Horticulture, Mount Stuart Trust.t:+44 (0) 1700 503877 ext 242 | m: 07471 900931 | e: [email protected] |w: www.mountstuart.com