Garsington Manor

Garsington Manor, in the village of Garsington, near Oxford, England, is a Tudor building, best known as the former home of Lady Ottoline Morrell, the Bloomsbury Group socialite. The house is currently owned by the family of the late Leonard Ingrams and is the setting for an annual summer opera season, the Garsington Opera.

The manor house was built on land once owned by the son of the poet Geoffrey Chaucer, and at one time had the name "Chaucers". Lady Ottoline and her husband, Philip Morrell, bought the manor house in 1914, at which time it was in a state of disrepair, having been in use as a farmhouse.

They completely restored it in the 1920s, creating landscaped Italian-style gardens. The parterre has 24 square beds with Irish yews at the corners; the Italian garden has a large ornamental pool enclosed by yew hedges and set about with statues; beyond, is a wild garden, with lime-tree avenues, shrubs, a stream and pond.

Garsington became a haven for the Morrells’ friends, including D. H. Lawrence, Siegfried Sassoon, Lytton Strachey, Aldous Huxley, Mark Gertler, and Bertrand Russell. In 1916, they invited conscientious objectors, including Clive Bell and other bloomsberries, to come and work on the home farm for the duration of World War I, to avoid prosecution. Aldous Huxley spent some time here before he wrote "Crome Yellow". The Morrells moved out in 1928.

External links

* [http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/arch/landscapes/ukpg/sites/garsingt.htm Information from the University of York]
* [http://www.gac.culture.gov.uk/search/Object.asp?object_key=12758 " The Pool at Garsington"] Mark Gertler's 1918 painting of Garsington Manor and its ornamental pool. Government Art Collection, UK Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
* [http://www.garsingtonopera.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=27&Itemid=47 Description of Garsington Manor and its gardens] at Garsington Opera.