Lost Gardens of London at the Garden Museum reveals sites both public and private, planted and constructed, formal and wild that once brought delight and respite
Even purposefully transient gardens can have a ‘greater and more enduring allure than places that have lingered for centuries’, according to the Garden Museum’s new exhibition Lost Gardens of London.
While I’m not sure that can be said of the particularly short-lived 2021 Marble Arch Mound, that recent bizarre venture doesn’t seem out of place in the eclectic collection of now-gone gardens in this fascinating show. The garden theme is interpreted in the very broadest sense, from private gardens of varying ambition through to grand formal urban spaces and extravagant public pleasure gardens for entertainment, as well as gardens for respite and for knowledge.
Along the way, we encounter grottoes, exotic examples of wildlife and planting, and everything from the manicured order of grand formal designs to wilder affairs such as the untamed tangle of artist Lucien Freud’s rampant buddleia. Spanning many centuries, these gardens are variously illustrated by paintings – including Canaletto’s Old Somerset House – drawings, prints, maps and photographs.
Curated by landscape architect and historian Todd Longstaffe-Gowan, the gardens are presented randomly ‘as they would be experienced in a stroll through the metropolis’. Aside from the social history revealed in these depictions, part of the appeal is discovering gardens which used to occupy familiar parts of the capital. It’s a surprise to learn that Notting Hill once hosted the luxury Hippodrome Racecourse, designed to rival Ascot and Epsom, which lasted just five years before shutting down in 1842 and being developed as housing. Meanwhile, the site of an eighteenth century botanical garden by celebrated botanist William Curtis lies beneath the platforms of Waterloo Station, while Finsbury Circus now occupies the Moorfields public recreation ground.
We get an idea of the many challenges that these gardens faced in centuries past, in particularly unfavourable conditions for cultivation such as industrial pollution and marshy land, as well as the more timeless threat of redevelopment, whether by railways or urban expansion. Belsize, for example, had yet to be swallowed up by the city’s northern expansion when Jan Siberechts painted View of a House and its Estate in Belsize, Middlesex in 1696, one of the oldest gardens in the exhibition.
Some of the most appealing exhibits depict gardens for diversion, from a woodcut of Elizabeth Holland’s 17th century Thames-side brothel, to grand Victorian pleasure gardens. The Surrey Zoological Gardens in Walworth, south London, feature in several exhibits. Huge efforts clearly went into the depiction of Mt Vesuvius in a massive painting of the Bay of Naples installed over a boating lake. This was clearly quite the spectacle – at dusk, special effects mimicked the eruption, as depicted in an 1837 lithograph.
In another exhibit, Summer Fashions for 1844, the wealthy show off their finery and enjoy novelties including elephants and a giant domed conservatory containing further wild animals, all set amid the pleasant lakeside gardens.
Even the East End boozer New Globe Tavern on Mile End Road had its own pleasure grounds, and staged ballets, concerts and ambitious illuminations in the 18th and first half of the 19th century, as depicted in an 1842 lithograph.
A watercolour shows Peerless Pool, which was London’s first open air bathing venue when it opened in 1756 on a site close to Old Street. This flourished for well over a century before eventually falling victim to redevelopment in 1876.
Eccentricities include the garden of surgeon and anatomist Dr John Hunter, who kept a menagerie including eagles and lions at his Earl’s Court home in the late 18th century. His garden also featured an artificial mount and a castellated tower equipped with a gun to ward off intruders. In 1862, the reclusive Duke of Portland saw off unwanted attention in a very different way when he erected a huge glass screen rising 6.5m above his garden wall on Cavendish Square. A photo from 1907 shows it still intact decades later.
Another doctor, a Dr Phené, occupied a mansion in Chelsea with a lavishly decorated exterior known locally as the ‘Gingerbread Castle’ and had a decidedly odd garden to match. As shown in a 1910 photograph, the 1.5 ha grounds were full of haphazardly arranged statuary, furniture and oddments.
More recent gardens in the exhibition are depicted in photographs. As well as the Lucien Freud buddleia and Marble Arch Mound, these include an ecological park on derelict land close to Tower Bridge (1979-1985). Named after the aforementioned botanist William Curtis, this included woodland, a pond and grassland and was visited by thousands of inner-city children. Many youngsters were involved in the rescue of 5000 frogs before the site was bulldozed. The former mayor’s office is now on its site.
The Marble Arch Mound isn’t the only artificial hill to make the exhibition – we learn that they actually have a long pedigree as a means to gain views beyond your own garden’s boundaries. Not all the mounds are conceived as garden elements – Smith’s Dust Heap on Gray’s Inn Road, depicted in an 1837 watercolour, was a huge pile of cinders and rubbish dating back reputedly since the Great Fire of London.
Lost they may be, but through this exhibition and book of the same name, this curious assortment of gardens lives on.
Lost Gardens of London, until 2 March 2025, Garden Museum, 5 Lambeth Palace Road, London SE1 7LB