In the summer of 2022, the billionaire restaurateur Richard Caring raised hackles in the normally calm London borough of Kensington and Chelsea by gaining permission to close part of a busy road for two weeks so that 12 five-tonne trees could be winched into his garden. But Caring had nothing on Bidzina Ivanishvili, Georgia’s richest man and former prime minister, who, in 2016, shipped a 100-year-old, 650-tonne tulip tree across the Black Sea. The tulip tree was the latest in a succession of specimens to travel to Ivanishvili’s new home — featuring a vast and varied botanical park in Georgia’s western Guria region.
Caring and Ivanishvili are not outliers in their use of horticulture to semaphore status. Gardens and parks have long been a green and leafy way to express wealth and power (as well as aesthetic sensibility). Not least because gardens emphasise man’s mastery over the natural world.
The development of the gardens at Versailles by the landscape architect André le Nôtre in the 17th century was a case in point — a fundamental part of Louis XIV’s transformation of a royal hunting lodge to a palace complex that was a monument to absolutist power. Le Nôtre created 800 hectares (three square miles) of geometrically precise layouts, ornate fountains and manicured lawns for the self-styled Sun King, the man for whom the gardens were an enduring and expensive passion.
Swamps were drained, the River Bièvre diverted to provide water for the plants and a massive hydraulic system called the Machine of Marly implanted to siphon even more water from the Seine to feed Louis’ thirsty perennials. Twenty years into the 40-year-plus project, as many as 36,000 workers toiled on the gardens on any given day — with injuries and deaths a regular occurrence.
The gardens (and building of the palace) were funded in part by high taxation. When that didn’t suffice, some industries — such as tapestry production — were nationalised to provide required materials at affordable prices. Despite spending an estimated 100 million livres on the Versailles project (billions of pounds in today’s money), Louis died before his vision was completely fulfilled.
Advertisement
Even three hundred years ago designing a luxurious garden was nothing new. In the ancient Roman period, the wealthy elite constructed elaborate gardens as symbols of their status and refinement. Preserved for ever as it was in AD79, when Vesuvius erupted, the Villa of the Papyri in Herculaneum featured extensive gardens adorned with sculptures, fountains and manicured lawns.
The Getty Villa in Los Angeles gives an idea of what the Villa of the Papyri was like in its heyday — its Outer Peristyle garden is an exact replica of that from the Villa of the Papyri. Built on a sprawling 64-acre plot of land overlooking the Ocean in Pacific Palisades to house and display to the public the antique art collection of billionaire J Paul Getty, the villa itself is largely modelled on its ancient Roman antecedent. The result is what one early visitor called “an intellectual Disneyland”. Costing about $18 million in the early 1970s, the complex is now worth upwards of half a billion dollars.
The Renaissance brought a revival of interest in classical art and culture, leading to a resurgence in luxury garden design across Europe. Italian Renaissance gardens, such as those at Villa d’Este in Tivoli, near Rome became the epitome of elegance and refinement. Commissioned by Cardinal Ippolito II d’Este in the 16th century, the gardens at Villa d’Este featured terraces, waterfalls and intricate fountains.
The creation of the gardens meant the demolition of many buildings in the area including public monuments and private homes, as well as roads. Despite lawsuits from disgruntled neighbours, d’Este ploughed on — quite literally. Tonnes of earth were excavated, canals dug and a river diverted to feed the gardens.
By the late 1560s, however, things ground to a halt when the cardinal started to run out of money. A short while before his death, in 1572, d’Este was forced to pawn some of his cherished belongings to be able to afford to host Pope Gregory XIII at Tivoli.
Advertisement
In England, this was an age when a peach tree cost the equivalent of £400. Someone who could afford to buy more than one, however, was William Alington, 3rd Baron Alington. In the 1660s he built a new house in Horseheath Hall, Cambridgeshire. The surrounding garden, “with a sweet prospect and stately avenue” according to the diarist John Evelyn, along with the house cost the equivalent of £33 million to build. Horseheath’s orchard was stocked with some of most expensive varieties of peach at the time, such as the Lion and the Violett Muscatt.
Thirty years later, the gardens of Levens Hall in Cumbria took on the form they still exhibit today — including the world’s oldest topiary garden. Laid out by Guillaume Beaumont, gardener to King James II and former pupil of none other than Versailles’ André le Nôtre, this includes over 100 pieces in various shapes such as a judge’s wig, a flask of ale and Queen Elizabeth I and her Maids of Honour. As some of the trees are more than 300 years old, the garden sculptures can reach over nine feet in height today — making for a breathtaking layout.
By the 18th century, Lancelot “Capability” Brown was the landscape architect behind masterpieces such as the grounds at Blenheim Palace and Highclere. Blenheim’s massive outdoor spaces are split between parkland and formal gardens. Brown landscaped the parkland. The formal gardens took on their present form at the beginning of the 20th century. These include the duke’s private Italian Garden with its intricately laid and trimmed curlicues of hedges and stately pathways. At the height of his career in the 1760s, Brown could command £500 (the equivalent of more than £70,000 today) for one commission, although he was paid significantly more — £21,538 over a ten-year period — at Blenheim. That equates to £34.4 million today for one project.
Those keen 18th-century garden-lovers would have appreciated the work of Ganna Walska. Born Hanna Puacz in Poland in 1887, Walska married six times, often to wealthy men. From her third husband she received a settlement of $3 million (nearly $56 million today). Her fourth was the scion of an agricultural machinery fortune, while her fifth was an inventor who claimed to have invented a death ray. In 1936 the United Press Association suggested that the fortunes of her four wealthiest husbands to that date amounted to $125 million ($2.8 billion).
By 1941, Walska had primarily settled in Montecito, the lush Californian town now home to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Here she set about creating Lotusland, a 37-acre series of 19 themed gardens set around her estate. Walska spent 43 years and a considerable sum of money — the $916,185 (just over $7 million) raised in a 1971 sale of 146 pieces of Walska’s beloved jewellery collection went to funding the gardens, for example — on creating and maintaining the gardens, which are now open to the public.
Advertisement
Visitors can enjoy rare dawn redwoods, shade palms native to Mexico, Central and South America, and a tranquil Japanese garden. A whimsical “horticultural zoo” is filled with 26 topiaries in the shape of bears, giraffes, dolphins and more. Meanwhile, the “water stairs”, a set of 14 tiered basins, still survives, though the original pleasure pond they fed into, complete with its own sailing boat, is no longer present.
For Walska, like her many predecessors, creating the perfect garden was a consuming passion. For some, their version of perfection was a carefully regimented, nature-bending expression of complete power, for others it was a space to relax and partake of intellectual or spiritual pursuits. For all of them, however, no matter the motivation, the garden was an ultimate status symbol.
Create your own garden paradise
Six of the best garden designers
1. Harris Bugg studio was awarded best in show at the 2023 Chelsea Flower Show. Working on everything from commercial spaces to country houses, it has particular experience of integrating conservation concerns.
2. Arabella Lennox-Boyd has worked on more than 800 gardens across the globe, making her a versatile choice. Embracing design and proportion, notable projects include the roof garden of No 1 Poultry, the Serpentine Sackler Gallery in London and Eaton Hall in Cheshire.
3. Jo Thompson Landscape & Garden Design has recently worked on the regeneration of the walled garden at Water Lane in Kent and is helping in the restoration of Highgate Cemetery.
4. Eight-time Chelsea Gold Medal winner Tom Stuart-Smith is designing the National Garden Scheme’s 2024 Chelsea Flower Show Garden, which will then be relocated to Maggie’s Centre at Addenbrook’s Hospital, Cambridge.
5. Robert Myers Associates has taken on private and commercial projects including the landscape design of Duke of York Square in Chelsea.
6. Landform Consultants works on a range of projects across the UK. The company’s Principal Landscape Designer, Catherine MacDonald, has designed the Boodles National Gallery Garden at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show — taking inspiration from the gallery’s collection during its 200th-anniversary year.
Add a splash of water
Channel Louis XIV and add your very own water feature. Chilstone creates traditional garden foundations for that heritage touch, while your gardener and landscape architect will be able to advise on plumbing and irrigation.
Create a sculpture park
Sculpture and gardens have long gone hand in hand. David Harber creates stunning sculptures for private and corporate clients around the world, featuring smooth lines and architectural forms that blend with the landscape. For a more traditional look, Architectural Heritage creates stone and metal accessories and sources antique ones.
