It wouldn’t be an overstatement to say that my family and I traveled to England last month to see gardens. Particularly, romantic English gardens in the rosy flush of June. And specifically, three gardens I’ve longed to see for years: the famous estate gardens Sissinghurst and Great Dixter, and my friend and fellow blogger Victoria Summerley’s garden in the Cotswolds village of Bibury, about 2 hours west of London.

I’ve followed Victoria, a garden author and retired journalist, since she lived in London and blogged about her urban, tropical-style garden at Victoria’s Backyard. In 2012 she relocated to Bibury and started blogging at Tales from Awkward Hill, named for the small hill on which she lives, just up the lane from the famous old weavers’ cottages of Arlington Row. Her own charming stone cottage was built in the early to mid-1800s, and she’s been making a new garden there for the past 6 years. (Read her touching “teach them how to say goodbye” article in the Independent about leaving her old garden.)

Victoria and Rufus, her Tibetan terrier, welcomed us through the Awkward Hill Cottage gate. I’d just seen Victoria at Garden Bloggers Fling and my own garden in Austin a month earlier, and now I was thrilled to be able to visit her garden. And Rufus — well, I fell in love with him on sight. He gratefully accepted pats, adorably leaning against my legs and looking up as if to say, “I love you too. Or at least your pats.”

Victoria led us around to the back garden, where a pink rose clings to the old stone walls and an inviting, low-walled terrace is enveloped by flowering perennials. It’s as romantic and lovely as Forster’s Howards End.

On a terrace table, a brightly colored bouquet stands out against an emerald rectangle of green lawn. At the far end, overlooking a meadow beyond the fence, a focal-point metal arbor draws the eye.

I like the way Victoria uses the arbor, matching potted evergreens, and a bird bath to pull the eye out into the meadow while framing the view.

Victoria terraced the sloping yard to create level areas of lawn and perennial beds. The formality of the geometric lawn is balanced by wonderfully shaggy borders, like this one of ‘Alison Blackman’ phormium, red valerian (Centranthus ruber var. coccineus), and a graceful ornamental grass. The level just above this one, to the right…

…is shaded by a neighbor’s stone wall and a couple of trees. Shallow stone steps lead up to a strip of lawn, where Rufus is cooling his belly. Victoria lets plants seed into the steps for casual country charm, while a pair of potted yews frames the view and accents the steps.

Beneath a tree, a bench and hanging birdcage create an inviting vignette. Rufus shows off his Texas flag bandana! Victoria says she collects bandanas when she travels and has Rufus wear his visitors’ colors. He looked so good in his Texas necktie that I began contemplating ways to sneak him into my suitcase for the trip home.

Turning around, let’s step down two terraces toward another lawn and a white-trunked tree.

A stone birdbath anchors this small lawn, with lovely borders and a small patio with steamer chairs just below the main terrace.

Victoria uses repetition in the lower border, which she’s dubbed “not-a-hedge,” creating a scrim of fastigiate yew, white broom, and phlomis, with assorted grasses and irises.

The golden yews stand like short fence posts, rhythmically marking off the length of the border.

The long view toward the terrace and the house.

Looking the other way, toward the meadow, dark-leaved Sambucus ‘Black Tower’ stands out amid the greens.

Here you can see how the lawns on different terraces relate to one another. They provide a green expanse to rest the eye, allow the perennial borders to act as a frame, and give Rufus a place to play.

Phormium, red valerian, and ornamental grass

Geranium sanguineum var. striatum, a variation of bloody cranesbill

Terrace with steamer chairs…

…and potted palm.

I noticed a white goose ornament coordinating with white flowers.

From the side you see the wall that the steamer chair backs up to, with a lovely stone sphere set on top.

View of the bird-bath lawn from the upper terrace

You can access the rest of the garden by continuing down the terraces, but Victoria led us around the house and back to the gate to start our tour there. I got sidetracked along the way by pink roses, valerian, and other plants.

Looking back along the terrace

Atop the low walls, Victoria sets bowls of succulents. These were in bloom.

And these sempervivums are playing host to a volunteer daisy of some sort.

Container garden along the house

Just off the drive, near the gate, a rustic arbor smothered in honeysuckle beckons you to enter the garden.

But first let’s admire the Sambucus ‘Black Tower’ leaning over the stone wall, complemented by pale-pink perennial geranium.

Sambucus flower

From the lowest level, you have access to a flight of stone stairs up to the terrace. Victoria had these handsome walls and steps constructed as the first stage in making her new garden.

Backing up, a wider view reveals how the walls relate to the house and the perennial beds at their base. For reference, note the potted yellow-green Japanese maple in this photo and the one above. In the shade of the trees behind us…

…a gray-blue Chippendale-style bench offers a place to sit and enjoy the view. Another of Victoria’s bouquets brightens the table, accented by a mushroom-shaped staddle stone. Victoria has a half-dozen or so of these throughout her garden. I’ve never seen them in the States, but according to Wikipedia, staddle stones were “originally used as supporting bases for granaries, hayricks, game larders, etc. The staddle stones lifted the granaries above the ground thereby protecting the stored grain from vermin and water seepage.”

This lower part of the garden is looser and curvier than the geometric planes in the terraces near the house, with more of a country casual feel.

Under one enormous old tree, a white metal bench sits deep in the shade against a stone wall. I believe Victoria said this was her next project, and she’s adding shade-loving plants here.

Nearby, in an open, sunny spot, she’s created a small fish pond fed by a stone-edged stream.

A grassy garden grows around it, partially hiding it from view until you get right up on it — a fun surprise.

Orange fish swim in the pond…

…echoing the color of geum flowering nearby.

The pumpkin orange looks terrific near yellow-green foliage and flowers.

You can see I love these.

After touring her garden, we walked with Victoria and Rufus around Bibury to see the sights. The stone cottages at Arlington Row, built in the 13th century (yes, the 1200s, folks), are just down the lane from her house. We joined camera-toting tourists here to snap pictures of this famous scene.

Clematis climbing one of the cottages

These cottages appear on British passports, which apparently spurred the wave of tourism that Bibury now experiences on a daily basis (along with other Cotswold villages).

Victoria has written about the tourist jams in her village, but still, it was surprising to witness. These people are taking pictures of Arlington Row from across the River Coln.

Valerian, aka Jupiter’s beard, self-seeded in the wall along the river

It must be strange to live here and see people (like us!) walking your narrow lanes and taking pictures of everything. But everyone we met, as Victoria walked us around, was friendly and understanding. When your town is this charming, perhaps you are simply happy to share it with the world.

Stone eagle finial atop a wall

Dry-stacked stone walls like these line the roads throughout the village.

St. Mary’s Church, “a Saxon Church with Norman and subsequent additions.” I wish we’d had time to go inside, but we had a reservation for afternoon tea at nearby Barnsley House.

Poppies flowering in the verge

One of many lovely stone cottages in Bibury

We are so grateful to Victoria for opening her home and garden to us, and for showing us around her adopted hometown. It was a treat to see Bibury from the perspective of one who lives there, and not just as a tourist, and the whole place could not have been more beautiful. Thank you, Victoria (and Rufus)!

Coming up next: Backtracking to Burford Garden Company for shopping and English breakfast. For a look back at our sightseeing in Oxford, click here.

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