The roots of the Formal English Garden can actually be traced back to the early Roman times.
Formal English Gardens as we know them today originated during the18th Century, from about the 1740's.
These gardens represented a relaxation of the formal, symmetrical, and highly ordered gardens of the French Renaissance periods.
In the later years of the 19th century there was a return to more formal, symmetrical and geometric shapes, and today's English Garden often mixes these elements first seen in the Italian and French Renaissance periods with the more relaxed, but still highly formal English Gardens of the 1700's.
Formal English gardens in the true tradition embody, above all other things, an idealized view of nature. They draw heavily upon classical elements rooted in Greek, Roman and Chinese history.
Antique Roses |
Delphinium |
Foxglove |
Clipped Yew |
Boxwood |
Bluebells |
Snapdragon |
David Austin Roses |
Hollyhock |
Bleeding Heart |
Saracocca |
Garden Peony |
Hyacinth |
Clematis |
Ionic Temple at Chaswick House Gardens
Vanbrugh's Rotunda at Stowe Gardens
Grotto at Bowood House Gardens