Landscape garden at Hill Pasture and Ashgrove House (EHER 46708)

A modern landscaped garden designed by Humphrey Waterfield in 1936 situated north of Broxted on the B1051.

LOCATION, BOUNDARIES, AREA, LANDFORM and SETTING Hill Pasture and Ashgrove are situated north of Broxted on the B1051. The site is undulating, with land falling away to the east, north and south. Further south, the land rises again to the site of Ashgrove. ENTRANCES and APPROACHES Hill Pasture is reached by a short drive off the Thaxted Road, very overshadowed by trees. At the end of the drive, down some steps, a door is visible in a wall, apparently the original front door of the house. However, this door opens, not into the house, but into an open walled space with a path running under a covered walk on timber posts to the front door proper. This space is open to the south, designed as an outer courtyard, giving the first unexpected view of the garden from the terrace, with is low retaining wall of brown flint pebbles. To the left of the wall containing the ‘front’ door is an ornamental wrought iron gate leading through a yew hedge into another space, the inner courtyard, enclosed by hedge and wall. On the left of the path is a brick pillared pergola with beds for tender plants and two small lily tanks, now dry. The path passes through the return of the yew hedge before reaching the back door. Ashgrove House is reached by a long gravelled drive flanked by trees, further south off the same road. PRINCIPAL BUILDINGS Hill Pasture, the original house, designed by Erno Goldfinger, was in the 1930s a ‘modern’ style and single storied. A flat roofed first floor and studio extension to the north of the same style were added in the 1960s, the design for which he entrusted to Gerald Flower. The external finish is painted brickwork and render, with large plain window openings. Ashgrove House, originally built in the 1950s, which appears to have been enlarged, is of painted brickwork under a concrete pantile roof. A detached garage is a later addition. GARDENS The gardens of Hill Pasture consist of one long vista, and many separate compartments. The vista runs south-south-east from the window of the main room, down the slope and up the other side. It is lined on each side by a yew hedge, that to the east having projecting buttresses, now lost, to enclose a series of flower beds. The only survivor is a semi-circle of box enclosing a curved stone bench not far from the house. On the south side, steps lead up to a pair of semi-circular box hedges where, to the west, the former Japanese garden and moon gate would be visible. At the top of the slope, and visible from the house, was a lead statue of a boy holding flowers, now lost. At the very south-east end of this axial line are two brick seat shelters, and a raised viewing platform of brick and concrete slab, now very overgrown, reached by quadrant steps. There are fine views here over the open countryside to the east. Returning along the yew walk, an area of lawn and planted cherry trees is concealed on the west side. A pond near the top of the slope was too overgrown to be examined. The north-east corner of Hill Pasture House is enclosed by a raised brick terrace planted with dwarf box hedging in geometrical patterns and reached by two sets of projecting semi-circular brick steps. To the east, the ground falls to a square brick pavilion under a pyramidal tiled roof in a poor state of repair. The pavilion leads to the rectangular swimming pool with small apsidal extensions at each end, and rectangular extensions on each long edge. The pools is enclosed to the north, the east and partly to the south by a series of high cast iron open lattice arches, partly covered by climbing roses. On the east side of the lattice arches is a gingko tree. To the north west, between the pool and the former kitchen garden, is a large overgrown meadow, previously managed to encourage the growth of wild flowers. South-east of the swimming pool is a large weeping willow, originally with a lead tank at its base. Passing south through a bank of shrub roses, a rectangular lily pond, now dry, is reached. At the east end of the pond is a dead swamp cypress and at the west a circular iris bed, surrounded by a circular paved path and a low retaining wall of brown flint pebbles. Either side of the lily pond are cypress trees, described in a 1961 Country Life article as Chamaecyparis lawsonianca Triomphe de Boskoop. To the south of the path between these two features is a semi-circular box hedge enclosing a stone wall head. Further south is the former orchard with some surviving overgrown apple trees. To the north of the lily pond is the Temple of Love with a fretted dome of wrought iron beside a small circular pool, now dried up. To the west of the temple is a line of yews that have been severely cut and not recovered. In the gardens of Ashgrove House is a sunken patio, paved with York stone slabs with gravel between, accessed by steps on each side at the southern end. A bench at this end looks along the patio, over an oval pool and through the moon gate into what was formerly the Japanese garden. No original planting appears to survive here. The pool is crossed by stepping stones. The moon gate is formed in a twelve foot high brick wall, capped by pineapple stone finials. To the east of the moon gate, the wall returns at an obtuse angle for a short distance, the line being continued by several brick planting panels towards the south east corner of the garden. There is dwarf and full sized conifer planting here, and the southern boundary of the garden is the original leylandii hedge, now very overgrown. KITCHEN GARDEN The former kitchen garden, now largely disused, was to the north of the house, Hill Pasture, with the Thaxted Road to the west and a beech hedge to the east.