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d_London_Garden_hl.qxd 4/12/06 8:19 AM Page 11 Notes on the Early History of early as 1086 when it was listed in the Kensington Palace Gardens Domesday Book. Nottingham House was one By Jennifer Ledfors of a number of grand mansions built in the area, and was owned by a series of aristocratic he history of the gardens at Kensington families until it was purchased by William and Palace has often been overshadowed by Mary soon after their coronation in February T that of the Palace itself and its occu- 1689 , following which it was renamed pants. Well-known as the birthplace of Queen Kensington Palace. The royal couple had Vi" oria, the Palace has been home to numer- sought a suitable home in a location that ous members of the royal family from William offered them the fresh air occasionally lacking and Mary onwards, many of whom played an in the capital; Kensington manor was far instrumental role in the development of the enough outside London to escape the polluted surrounding pleasure gardens. Recently, a air yet much closer than the royal residence of team commissioned by Historic Royal Palaces Hampton Court Palace. Very little is known of was brought together to re-examine the gar- the garden and estate at Kensington prior to dens based upon historical documentation. its acquisition by the crown. In contrast with Surviving material about the history of the exceptional documentation of Hampton Kensington Palace and its grounds, gardens Court’s gardens that begins in the sixteenth and the surrounding park can be found in century, Kensington’s garden building papers of the Office of Works and other man- accounts only date from the late seventeenth uscript sources held at the National Archives century soon after the royal purchase. in Kew, the British Library and other reposi- Upon acquisition of Nottingham House, tories. The research efforts of the team proved a variety of changes to the mansion and most rewarding and will be revealed in a series grounds were initiated to convert it into a royal of articles appearing in The London Gardener . residence, these modifications and refurbish- The focus of this article is the early history of ments setting off at an accelerated pace from Kensington Palace Gardens, particularly some early summer 1689 , under the eye of Queen of the more unusual or little known fa" s per- Mary who personally oversaw the progress. taining to their improvement under royal Daniel Defoe, writing in the mid-1720s, command. (fig. 1) records: ‘The first laying out of these gardens The manor of Kensington is recorded as was the design of the late Queen Mary, who 11 d_London_Garden_hl.qxd 27/11/06 9:38 am Page 12 THE LONDON GARDENER or The Gardener’s Intelligencer Vol no. For the years - finding the air agreed with, and was necessary William Wheatly made window lights, gates to the health of the king, resolved to make it and flooring for the outhouses in the palace agreeable to her self too, and gave the first grounds;3 Richard Stacey, bricklayer, made orders for enlarging the gardens.’ 1 repairs to the banqueting house, the green- Although the king and queen took an house, the ‘gardineres houses’, and long a " ive interest in the royal gardens, and most se" ions of brick walls, and threw up new walls matters pertaining to them, it was William around the ‘dung-ground’ and the kitchen gar- Bentinck, 1st Earl of Portland who presided den; John and Charles Price were paid for over their creation, refurbishment and man- ‘painters work done in the banquetting house agement. Bentinck was appointed as and greenhouse and for painting severall rales, Superintendent of the Royal Gardens in 1689 , posts, and gates’ in the ‘great garden’; the and he in turn employed the pre-eminent mason Thomas Hill laid down over 70 feet of ‘landskip gard’ners’ and nurserymen George purbeck paving throughout the gardens, London and Henry Wise to assist him. including floors in the Mount banqueting The estate’s improvements were house and by the bowling green; and Richard financed out of the annual income of Osgood, founder, was remunerated for ‘new £600,000 that Parliament granted to William casting & repairing great flower potts of hard and Mary in 1689 . The Treasury paid for these metal and other services’.4 Furniture was also initiatives through money administered by the made for the new gardens: the sculptor Office of Works. Bills were itemised, listing Edward Pearce carved a ‘shaire [chair] for the quantities and prices of wares, equipment and garden with a canopy of drapery’, and ‘ 4 chairs plants, and detailed estimates were submitted and two seats with dolphins, scollop shells, to the Treasury and then referred to the Office etc.’; and ‘Henry Lobb joyner’ was commis- of Works for review. In addition, labourers, sioned to make ‘a large chair’, and ‘severall craftsmen and artisans were commissioned [other] chairs to stand in the garden walks’. through the Office of Works to begin refur- Eight ‘very handsome plane [sic] cane chairs bishment of the royal residence. A wide variety with backs and a cane table’ were also made of people were hired to refurbish and recast ‘for a little room that goes into the garden.’ 5 the mansion and its grounds, including brick- The crowning achievement of London layers, glaziers, joiners, smiths, carpenters, and Wise’s work was the transformation of the ironmongers and other labourers, with the ‘upper garden’, north of the palace – a flat tools of their trade transported to Kensington expanse scarred with gravel pits – into a by land and water. Many of them had worked ‘Master piece of art in the new regular manner for the Crown on other estates throughout the of greens and gravel-gardening’. Joseph country. Addison was warm in his praise for ‘our hero- Between 1689 and 1696 a great flurry of ick poets’ who created the New Wilderness, garden building a " ivity took place in the the Mount and the Sunken Garden, remark- palace grounds. The surviving accounts pro- ing in 1712: vide a detailed record of the improvements and If as a critick I may single out any passage of the craftsmen commissioned to carry out the their works to commend I shall take notice of that por- work: William Emmett decorated the pair of tion the upper garden at Kensington which at first was large gates next to the guardhouse in the nothing more than a gravel pit. It must have been a fine palace grounds with the King’s badges, crowns, genius for gardening that could have thought of form- roses and other flowers; 2 Thomas Collestone ing such an unsightly hollow into so beautiful an area made ‘two large [sun] dyalls’, and supplied ‘ 40 and to have hit the eye with so uncommon and agree- great flower pots of Portland stone richly able scene as that which it is now wrought into. To give carved’; the gardener Henry Timberman dug this particular spot of ground the greater effect they holes for posts, ‘removed gravel of the walles have made a very pleasing contrast; for as on one side of digging down & removing a baulke of earth’ the walk you see this hollow basin with its several little near the palace forecourt; master carpenter plantations lying so conveniently under the Eye of the 1 . Daniel Defoe A Tour Thro' the whole Island of Great Britain, vol. 1, 3. NA, AO 1/2493/403. 1724-27 (London, 1727). 4. NA, Work 19/48/1, f . 111. 2 . National Archives (NA), Work 5/53, p. 357v. 5. NA, LC 5/150, p. 227 ; AO 1/2482/298, f.10. 12 d_London_Garden_hl.qxd 27/11/06 9:38 am Page 13 Notes on the Early History of Kensington Palace Gardens 1. Joseph Smith, View of Kensington House from the south, c.1713-14 (Courtesy Guildhall Library, Corporation of London) 13 d_London_Garden_hl.qxd 4/12/06 8:20 AM Page 14 THE LONDON GARDENER or The Gardener’s Intelligencer Vol no. For the years - 2. The Civet Cat, engraving from Pomet, The Compleat History of Drugges published in Paris in 1694, first English edition published 1715 (Private Collection) 3. ‘ Cochlea terrestris’ from Conrad Gesner’s Historiae Animalium, vol. 4 (Zurich, 1551-8), taken from the German edition published by Johann Saur, Frankfurt am Main, 1598 14 d_London_Garden_hl.qxd 27/11/06 9:38 am Page 15 Notes on the Early History of Kensington Palace Gardens beholder; on the other side of it there appears a seeming tains, pipes and drains were installed through- mount made up of trees rising one higher than another out the grounds with a view to supplying suf- in proportion as they approach the center. A spectator ficient water for the various palace needs. For who has not heard of this account of it would think this instance, in May 1700, the ground in the circular mount was not only a real one but that it had Parade was dug up in order to insert 240 feet been actually scooped out of that hollow space which I of pipe to drain the excess water from the gar- have before mentioned.6 dens and to pump water out of the garden Various changes also took place in the reservoir, which fed water into the many foun- Paddock, beyond the eastern pale of the plea- tains in the gardens.10 (fig. 4) And much later, sure grounds. Here William and Mary – both in 1727, a plan for a new reservoir was proposed of whom had a great and informed interest in to promote a consistent supply of water to the ‘fforregne plants’ and exotic beasts and birds – palace and gardens.

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