This week I had the opportunity to visit Kilver Court gardens on the outskirts of Shepton Mallet. It’s a beautiful landscaped garden with a viaduct (sadly, now closed) in the backdrop and lots of flowers in bloom. As a girl, my mum in the 1950s used to walk through the gardens on her way to and from school. Back then, the gardens weren’t what they are now. She used to walk through the gate below (now boarded up), into a lane and then be almost home.
We also walked up to the now Mulberry Outlet shop, which used to be her primary school. Sadly, if your budget is like mine, even discounted Mulberry is out of my price range! However, the building is worth a look. It felt like a mini chapel, but was home to 3 classes. When the steam train used to pass by, the sparks from the train sometimes used to catch fire to the bank, and the fire had to be stamped out. We don’t get that anymore!
I think Kilver Court became a landscaped space in the 1980s. I know as a girl, I went to a wedding there. My gran clutched hold of my hand. Given the amount of open water about, she might have feared I’d run off for an unplanned swim…Whilst the gardens are beautiful, unless you’ve got an impeccibly behaved child (and I don’t), the amount of water might cause you to have heightened stress levels!
It was a gorgeous sunny day, so the greens were very vibrant. I’m still drawn to the black and white picture though. Maybe I’m just not confident yet in landscape colour pictures? I guess you can hide a few mistakes behind black and white!
Still, as always, I was drawn towards taking some macro shots of flowers. I may have found my thing. I just enjoy close up flower pictures more. Below are a few examples of flower photos I took at Kilver Court gardens.
https://www.kilvercourt.com/garden/the-gardens-today
Here’s a link to Kilver Court gardens. I don’t work for them! I just like to highlight great places near where I grew up.
All the photos in this post can be viewed in the following gallery:
http://www.smudgeonthelens.co.uk/kilver-court-gardens/