The perfect weekend started with a surprise gift of Behind The Mask, the latest biography about the life of Vita Sackville-West.
It is the first new biography released in 30 years so I am anxious to start reading.
The surprise continued with a Sunday visit to Sissinghurst Castle, the home Vita Sackville-West shared with her husband Harold Nicolson.
When is the perfect weekend to visit Sissinghurst Castle?
Some would say springtime when the fields are ablaze with bulbs, others prefer June when the famous white rose garden is in full flower.
July and August for the full vibrancy of the herbaceous borders?
Sissinghurst Castle requires multiple visits, like all gardens it alters every day, in every season and in every light.
The garden at Sissinghurst Castle is designed as a series of rooms, each enclosed and with their own personality and character.
One “door” leads to another, clipped hedges and pink coloured walls divide the garden leading the eye from one grand vista to another.
We wandered through the autumnal landscape, loving the peace, the country air and the colours.
The russet shades were everywhere.
Many of the garden beds had been cleared and the soil turned but the fiery leaves against the verdant lawns were
enough to make this the perfect weekend to capture the castle.
The day wasn’t brilliant… heavy in that familiar English way… and yet it was no way near dreary or dull.
The changing leaves took care of that.
Wandering around Sissinghurst Castle made me think about the vision required to create such magnitude and the legacy it leaves.
How does a vision so deep take hold? Do we think about the legacy that we leave behind?
I wonder whether our lives are so frenetic, our world so global that the idea of staying in one place long enough to create something as visionary would be alien.
The comittment required is extraordinary… they were extraordinary people.
The National Trust are the custodians, since Vita Sackville-West’s death, taking over the garden, the farm and the buildings in 1967.
Sissinghurst Castle is now open all year round and if you are planning a trip to England don’t miss it from your itinerary.
The lunch in The Granary is one of the best Sunday lunches we ever had… home made everything.
and as for the cream tea… scones, blackcurrant jam and clotted cream… irresistible… xv
Sissinghurst Castle
Biddenden Rd, Cranbrook
Kent TN17 2AB
+44 (0) 1580 710701
Behind The Mask: The Life of Vita Sackville-West by Matthew Dennison
Vita: The Life of Vita Sackville-West by Victoria Glendinning
