page_title: Barrington Court
section_title: Gardens
hierarchical_section_title: Barrington Court / Gardens
caption_attribution_description: English: Barrington Court
context_page_description: Barrington Court is a Tudor manor house begun around 1538 and completed in the late 1550s, with a vernacular stable court, situated in Barrington, near Ilminster, Somerset, England.
  The house was owned by several families by 1745 after which it fell into disrepair and was used as a tenant farm. After repair by architect Alfred Hoare Powell, it was the first house acquired by the National Trust, in 1907, on the recommendation of the antiquarian Canon Hardwicke Rawnsley. In the 1920s the house was renovated, the stable block turned into a residence and several outbuildings, gardens and gateways constructed.
  The house was originally surrounded by a medieval deer park and in the 17th century a formal garden was constructed. This had largely disappeared until a new garden was laid out by garden designer Gertrude Jekyll in an Arts and Crafts-style. It now contains walled kitchen gardens, fruit orchards and ornamental gardens.
context_section_description: In the 16th century the house was surrounded by a deer park. In the 1550s William Clifton took action, in the Star Chamber court, against local poachers who hunted deer in the park while he was away.
  The remains of the original gardens include a rectangular raised area or parterre 70 metres (230 ft) by 50 metres (160 ft) near a liner pond or canal which is 12 metres (39 ft) by 110 metres (360 ft). There is also geophysical evidence of a further 17th-century formal garden.
  Barrington Court is noted for its Arts and Crafts-style gardens for which garden designer Gertrude Jekyll provided planting plans. The gardens were laid out in 1917 by J. E. Forbes, of the partnership Forbes & Tate, for Lieut-Col. A. Arthur Lyle. There are a series of walled areas that include a white garden, a rose and iris garden and a lily garden.  The original plans are being used to restore the gardens; however, the planting scheme has been changed from that designed by Jekyll to that designed by Mrs Lyle in the 1960s.
  The walls of the kitchen garden were built in the 1920s and include two gateways with neoclassical architraves. The gravel paths are laid out in a square with a cross at the centre enhanced by a fountain surrounded by fruit trees, vegetable plots and soft fruits. There are carriage openings with wrought-iron gates.
  The kitchen garden provides produce for the property's restaurant located in the adjacent Strode House; this includes many types of fruit and vegetables. The local St Mary & St Peter's CE VC Primary School, which has bases at Barrington and Ilton, has a vegetable plot where the children plant, tend and cook the produce; the walls are also strewn with apple, pear and plum trees. Attached to the garden is a squash court.
  About 20 metres (66 ft) south west of the house is an unusual multi-faced sundial. It was built of stone and bronze, on a stone column. It is a dodecahedron surmounted by a heraldic lion. It was imported from California by Colonel Lyle in 1920.
  The gardens are Grade II* listed on the National Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.
caption: Part of house and gardens at Barrington Court in late summer
exif: {}