Page 43 - HG10

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BCD Special Report
Historic Gardens 2010
43
T
he Benmore fernery is a unique
building in a remarkable setting.
It occupies a remote site in
Benmore Botanic Garden, Argyll. Nestled
against the steep contour of a south west
facing hillside, the fernery incorporates a cliff
on its eastern side as an integral part of the
structure. It was constructed in the early 1870s
at the height of the Victorian fern craze, but
went into decline in the early 20th century
and lay derelict for nearly 100 years.
Ferneries are part of a strong tradition
in Britain, one that reached its height in the
second half of the 19th century when the
country was gripped by ‘pteridomania’: the
fern craze. It was Charles Kingsley, clergyman,
naturalist and later author of
The Water
Babies
, who coined the term pteridomania
in 1855 to describe the fascination for
ferns that was gripping the nation. It was
manifested not only in the cultivation of
ferns but in ‘fern ramblings’ and in a host
of activities involving the identification,
collection and exchange of fern species. The
craze encompassed both British and exotic
varieties, and it involved an impressive array
of associated structures and paraphernalia.
Pteridomania was sustained by the
publication of a wide range of literature,
from short guide books to lavishly illustrated
volumes of paintings and exquisite nature
prints. Evidence of the passion for ferns
remains with us in the form of the decorative
fernware that made its first significant
appearance at the 1862 International
Exhibition in London in the form of fern-
decorated pottery by Wedgwood and Dudson,
etched fern glassware and fern-decorated
wooden ‘Mauchline ware’. The Coalbrookdale
Company of Shropshire produced decorative
cast ironware in fern-like designs, including
a range of cast iron garden seats. Unfurling
fern fronds embellished grave stones
and ornamental garden stonework. The
decorated urns at Dawyck Botanic Garden,
for example, are encircled by fronds of the
hart’s-tongue fern and date from the 1840s.
There was a tremendous enthusiasm
for cultivating ferns in ornamental
Wardian cases (miniature glasshouses),
fern gardens and, of course, ferneries like
Joseph Paxton’s magnificent Tatton Park
fernery in Cheshire and Kibble Palace,
now gracing Glasgow Botanic Garden but
first erected at Coulport, Loch Long.
Unfortunately, the passion for fern
growing was accompanied by an obsession
with collecting them from the wild,
especially rare species. The populations
of oblong woodsia (
Woodsia ilvensis
) that
grew in the hills near Moffat in Dumfries
and Galloway were devastated by collectors
following the completion of the Carlisle-
to-Edinburgh railway line over nearby
Beattock summit in 1848. As the craze
continued even the more common species
suffered. John Hutton Balfour, Regius
Keeper at the Royal Botanic Garden
Edinburgh (RBGE), reported in 1870 that:
The ferns in Arran are gathered in vast
numbers, and nearly all the accessible specimens
of the rarer species are taken away… we saw
boys and women carrying large quantities
of ferns taken up by the roots with a view
of making a profit by the sale of them.
The original design
The Benmore fernery was constructed for
James Duncan, a wealthy sugar refiner. He
had purchased the Benmore Estate on the
Cowal Peninsula in 1870. During the 1870s
he made many changes, with additions to
the main house, the walled garden and
the stable block. He also planted over six
million trees, mainly conifers, across the
estate. Adjacent to the house he built a
large picture gallery for his extensive art
collection which included contemporary
works by the French impressionists,
and an experimental sugar refinery.
Duncan’s heated fernery was at some
distance from the other buildings in an area
that had been recently planted with conifers.
His picture gallery, sugar refinery and fernery
have been described recently by architect
Michael Thornley as ‘uncompromising
buildings... allied more closely to industrial
rather than domestic styles of architecture
of the time’ and as ‘strictly functional’.
Nevertheless, the setting of the fernery on
the hillside, with its thick walls, towering
south gable and curved glazed roof is
extremely dramatic. The building takes the
form of a stone casket embedded into the
steep hillside with a glazed barrel roof.
One can imagine Duncan’s visitors
first marvelling at the stunning collection
of paintings in his gallery and then being
conveyed across his estate to his other secret
treasure house, the fernery. Here they would
have climbed the steps to a small doorway at
the foot of the massive gable end and entered
under a dark vaulted entrance porch. Stairs
on either side led up to the broad middle
level where the visitor finally emerged into a
steamy, green paradise beside an ornamental
grotto that arched over an oval pool. Here
they would have been greeted by a profusion
of ferns in every direction: beside the paths,
rising up beside the steps, suspended from
the walls and probably with the broad fronds
of tree ferns silhouetted against the glazed
roof. Steps and paths edged in white quartz
formed a winding, figure-of-eight route for
exploring the interior. To the left and right
of the grotto two further sets of narrow stairs
reached up to the highest level, under the
short north gable and beside another fern bed
constructed above the grotto. From every wall
of the fernery cantilevered stones protruded,
providing further platforms for plantings,
while the damp exposed cliff face inside the
fernery provided a further natural habitat.
With its south west aspect, the highest
level in the fernery would have benefitted
from sun for much of the day, while plants
closer to the entrance, below the great
Embedded in a steep hillside, the derelict fernery
presented a challenging site for all concerned.
(Photo: MAST Architects)