From the archive: a Normandy manor house with formal gardens designed by Russell Page (2010)
To reach this beautifully kept house in Normandy, nestling among gentle hills, you follow a meandering route through lush pastures lined with wide hedgerows. The famous Normandy dairy herds graze here, and their sweet milk is used to make Camembert - there is even a cheese museum at Livarot. The surrounding hills are planted with apple orchards that produce a dry cider and its brandy equivalent, Calvados.
The manor house and its adjoining barn - known as the pressoir, where until recently apples were pressed - were built in the sixteenth century for the estate manager of the Duc d'Harcourt. In the Middle Ages, the land around the house as far as the eye could see was owned by the duke. The rich soil encouraged the growth of oak forest, though later, the oaks were felled to make way for apple orchards and, as you can see in this house, the timber was used for building. The exposed framework, infilled with clay mixed with straw or horsehair, gives the vernacular architecture its character.
After the French Revolution and the abolition of primogeniture, the house was divided up, and when the present owner came to buy it in 1973, it was derelict. Typically for Normandy, there was no garden; it sat among apple trees, roaming hens and grazing livestock.
The house was meticulously restored under the guidance of the Monument Historique and is now a listed building. Also listed is the garden created around it by the late Russell Page, the great, British garden designer. Some 20 years later, the apple presses were cast aside and the barn was converted to house two spare bedrooms, a summer dining room and a large changing room for the swimming pool that is hidden behind it.
The house is dominated by a deep, tiled roof and two vast chimney stacks, one at each end. The façade has two front doors side by side, an original feature to conserve internal space by providing direct entry to two reception rooms. Now, the right-hand door is no longer in use; the other leads into a new hall. It is a small space and, as you cross the threshold, you feel you are entering a sanctuary of elegance. There is abundance and restraint in the way the house is furnished, with each piece chosen for its particular place.
To the right of the hall is a drawing room over which preside busts of Henri IV and Voltaire. The walls are covered with an Indian-print French fabric, the pattern of which has been used to create a 'cornice' and a 'dado'.
To the left is the dining room-cum-library, which is inspired by the Codrington Library at All Souls College, Oxford, and is painted a gentle grey-what in France is called gris chateau or gris tendre. A high, eighteenth-century architect's table stands by the window. Above the books, which are protected by brass mesh, a frieze runs round the room; painted letters within the metopes spell out, in Latin, 'Without books you can't live happily and without food you can't live at all.'
The barn, more spacious than the house, is a delight. It has a Swedish-inspired spare bedroom with egg yolk-coloured walls and a pair of single four-poster beds acquired in the US. The summer dining room, too, has a Swedish quality with its cool grey palette.
The refinement and detailed perfection that envelop you inside continue outside, in Russell Page's garden. 'I asked Russell to look at the space in the early Seventies,' explains the owner. 'We walked around what was then a building site. He asked if I wanted an open or a closed garden, and I replied that I wanted both. We discussed the idea of several linked outside rooms, each with its own opening and perspective, and then retired for lunch. In a matter of minutes he had sketched out his ideas on a newspaper - the measurements and proportions of the final drawings hardly changed at all.'
Russell's genius lay in the sensitivity with which he would approach a project. He strongly believed that a garden had to belong to the landscape in which it lay. He sought 'to make a house sit down with a convincing garden around it'. Drawing on his formal training at the Slade - astonishingly, he was his own draughtsman and surveyor - he would set to work on the architecture of the garden, using his familiar hallmarks of clipped yew hedges, symmetry, immaculate lawns and hornbeam avenues. In this garden, he used all these devices but added an unusually modern feature: the front lawn is flanked with zigzagging, buttressed yew hedges which also act as a windbreak.
The bones of a garden, if properly cared for, can last a very long time, but herbaceous plants and shrubs inevitably reach the end of their lifespan. Russell died in 1985, and in 1994 Caroline Egremont, an experienced landscape designer, was asked to replant the cottage garden alongside the barn and to create a sundial garden. Later, she returned to replant the white terrace at the back of the house where the family eat outside.
'I was honoured to work on a Russell Page garden,' she recalls. 'His book, The Education of a Gardener, is my bible.' Her planting in the cottage garden is a riot of colour but is less gaudy than it was in Russell's day. He had the ability to surprise and his instructions here had been 'only plant colours that clash'. Today, Caroline's planting abounds with peonies, coreopsis, hollyhocks, helianthus, phlox and rudbeckia. Clipped-yew drums march through at intervals, echoing Russell's yew pyramids beyond. A group of 12 crab apples (Malus hupehensis), much used by Russell in his northern France gardens, are planted around the sundial in the Sundial Garden; these are in perfect scale with the cider-apple trees all around.
It is well known that Russell Page lost heart towards the end of his life. He felt that gardens were so ephemeral and that little of his work would survive. He needn't have worried in this case. With its owner's immaculate formality and meticulous eye for detail, this garden is in safe hands.
Fritz von der Schulenburg1/14Only one of the two original front doors is still in use, leading into a newly created hall.
Fritz von der Schulenburg2/14The opulent drawing room, to the right of the entrance hall, has views over the front lawn.
Fritz von der Schulenburg3/14A painting on one of the walls is Scandinavian.
Fritz von der Schulenburg4/14The rich colour scheme is underscored by the Indian-print French fabric on the walls, used to create a 'cornice' and 'dado'.
Fritz von der Schulenburg5/14The dining room-cum-library, inspired by the Codrington Library at All Souls College, Oxford, is painted a gentle grey - known in France as gris chateau or gris tendre.
Fritz von der Schulenburg6/14The restrained space of the dining room has elegant decorative touches such as the brass chandelier and velvet-covered chairs.
Fritz von der Schulenburg7/14A swimming pool is hidden behind the barn.
Fritz von der Schulenburg8/14The Swedish-style cubicles in the barn's swimming-pool changing room are topped with Indian-inspired roofs.
Fritz von der Schulenburg9/14The cool grey palette of the summer dining room gives it a Swedish quality.
Fritz von der Schulenburg10/14The spare bedroom in the barn is painted a rich egg-yolk yellow.
Fritz von der Schulenburg11/14The two single four-poster beds were purchased in the States.
Fritz von der Schulenburg12/14The garden is made up of linked rooms, each with its own opening and perspective; the white terrace where the family eat outside, was replanted by Caroline Egremont within the bones of the original design.
Fritz von der Schulenburg13/14The zigzagging yew hedges that flank the front lawn act as a windbreak.
Fritz von der Schulenburg14/14The house is dominated by a deep tiled roof and two vast chimney stacks; the exposed timber framework gives the vernacular architecture its distinctive character.
