About the Gardens

After the 1987 storm, the Trustees of the Foundation made a strategic review of the historic landscape of the gardens and formulated a long-term policy to ensure their survival for future generations

All gardens are the product of a combination of factors, from the physical givens of geology, topography and climate, to the social and cultural variables of the rise of fall of family dynasties, the whims of capricious owners and the shifts of garden fashion.

They may aspire to the permanence of works of art but are as ephemeral as a snowdrop: no sooner has each generation made its mark than the winds of time begin to erode it away.

In this respect the gardens at West Dean are no different from any other, with successive generations making their contribution.

Since 1622, when James Lewkenor built the original manor house, numerous additions, extensions and erasures have taken place in the gardens, usually coinciding with major changes to the house generated by the change in ownership or the ideas of a new generation.

When the present house was built in 1804, the gardens were enlarged and park laid out, while the kitchen garden was moved to its present position and enclosed by walls. Many of the existing mature beeches, limes, horse chestnuts, planes and cedars date from this period and the present layout owes much to their planting. This was the age of the 'picturesque' whose exponents advocated a return to some formality, but with the use of exotic trees. In 1818 the garden was extended to the west and flint walls were raised to enclose the pleasure grounds in which people walked.

Frederick Bower, who acquired the Estate in 1871, continued to develop the gardens and opened them annually to the public. Twenty years later William James purchased the Estate and made many improvements to the garden, including rebuilding and extending the range of glasshouses in the walled kitchen garden, the construction of the magnificent pergola in the North Lawn, plus a considerable amount of planting and refurbishment, both in the grounds and the arboretum.

After William James’ death in 1912 the house and gardens were occupied for long periods by a variety of tenants, as his son Edward spent ever longer periods abroad. As a consequence the gardens were subject to that inexorable slide into genteel decline that was fate of most large country house gardens throughout the United Kingdom during the first three-quarters of the twentieth century. This gradual process was brought to a dramatic denouement by the great storm of 1987, out of which apparent disaster West Dean's gardens have been given new life.

In the hands of Gardens Manager Jim Buckland and Gardens Supervisor Sarah Wain the 36 hectares (90 acres) of grounds, divided into four distinct areas: the gardens entrance; the walled kitchen garden; the pleasure grounds and St Roche’s Arboretum have carried out a bold re-development programme designed to bring the nineteenth century gardens into the twenty-first century.