0:00:01 > 0:00:07I believe that a really good way to understand a culture is through its gardens.
0:00:07 > 0:00:12This is an extraordinary journey to visit 80 inspiring gardens from all over the world.
0:00:12 > 0:00:17Some are very well-known, like the Taj Mahal or the Alhambra.
0:00:17 > 0:00:22And I'm also challenging my idea of what a garden actually is.
0:00:22 > 0:00:25So I'm visiting gardens that float on the Amazon -
0:00:25 > 0:00:27a strange fantasy in the jungle,
0:00:27 > 0:00:30as well as the private homes of great designers,
0:00:30 > 0:00:33and the desert flowering in a garden.
0:00:33 > 0:00:38And wherever I go I shall be meeting people that share my own passion for gardens
0:00:38 > 0:00:44on my epic quest to see the world through 80 of its most fascinating and beautiful gardens.
0:01:00 > 0:01:03In modern times at least, northern Europe has been the place
0:01:03 > 0:01:09where gardens and gardening have been the most vibrant and dynamic.
0:01:10 > 0:01:14There are hundreds of historic gardens across the region
0:01:14 > 0:01:18that one can visit, and millions of people do just that every year.
0:01:18 > 0:01:23There is clearly a common desire to walk through the past via the medium of a garden.
0:01:23 > 0:01:26Yet there is an overriding paradox accompanying that.
0:01:26 > 0:01:32How do you preserve the history of gardens and yet keep them alive,
0:01:32 > 0:01:36and accept the fact that all gardens change all the time.
0:01:40 > 0:01:46My journey begins with the quintessential English landscape garden.
0:01:46 > 0:01:52It then takes me across the Channel to the grand and sumptuous gardens of France.
0:01:52 > 0:01:55I shall then track back to Belgium and the Netherlands,
0:01:55 > 0:01:59and the gardens of some of my own personal design heroes.
0:01:59 > 0:02:03Finally, I will travel to the far north, beyond the Arctic Circle,
0:02:03 > 0:02:08to a garden where for a few summer months, the sun never sets.
0:02:09 > 0:02:12The immediate challenge facing this journey
0:02:12 > 0:02:17was to whittle the gardens down to an acceptable number.
0:02:17 > 0:02:20I mean, I could have chosen 80 gardens, just from northern Europe alone.
0:02:20 > 0:02:26So, the way I've resolved that is to make it an entirely personal journey.
0:02:26 > 0:02:31The gardens I'm about to visit are either ones that I've been longing to see all my life,
0:02:31 > 0:02:34or ones that I've been to before,
0:02:34 > 0:02:37I know well and I want to share with you.
0:02:40 > 0:02:45I am starting with the only English gardens in my entire round-the-world journey.
0:02:45 > 0:02:48I have chosen them because although they are very different,
0:02:48 > 0:02:51I think that they represent the very best of British gardens.
0:02:51 > 0:02:54In fact, both are amongst the very best in the world.
0:02:54 > 0:02:56The first is Rousham in Oxfordshire.
0:03:02 > 0:03:04Rousham, designed by William Kent,
0:03:04 > 0:03:07is astonishingly little known or visited,
0:03:07 > 0:03:10yet I think it's the best landscape garden in the country.
0:03:18 > 0:03:22In 1737, Kent, then better known as an architect,
0:03:22 > 0:03:26was hired by the owner General Dormer to make modifications
0:03:26 > 0:03:29to the house at Rousham and to revamp the garden.
0:03:32 > 0:03:36In the drawing room of the house is this plan of the garden.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39We don't know who drew it but we know that it was drawn up
0:03:39 > 0:03:44round about the time of Kent's death in the 1750s.
0:03:44 > 0:03:47And it shows the layout as Kent intended it,
0:03:47 > 0:03:52and it also shows it almost exactly as it is today.
0:03:52 > 0:03:54It's hardly changed at all.
0:03:54 > 0:03:57The head gardener at the time that this was drawn up, McCleary,
0:03:57 > 0:04:02used to take people round down here, down this path
0:04:02 > 0:04:07and then round, down there and then back up that avenue
0:04:07 > 0:04:09and along the bottom.
0:04:09 > 0:04:11And that's the route that I'm going to take.
0:04:20 > 0:04:25Kent's radical contribution to garden design
0:04:25 > 0:04:30was to include the landscape as part of the picture.
0:04:30 > 0:04:31Up till then,
0:04:31 > 0:04:37gardens had tried to be refuges from what was seen as a potentially hostile world around them.
0:04:37 > 0:04:41And here at Rousham, he deliberately sculpted the land
0:04:41 > 0:04:45with this beautiful curve down to the river, didn't obscure that.
0:04:45 > 0:04:48And then the field and the meadow below and the cattle grazing,
0:04:48 > 0:04:50which were meant to be seen.
0:04:50 > 0:04:55The road left unobscured so they could see droves of cattle going across.
0:04:55 > 0:05:00And then there are two buildings up there - one which was a cottage which he reshaped to look as
0:05:00 > 0:05:02though it might just be a castle,
0:05:02 > 0:05:05and the eye-catcher on the horizon, totally false.
0:05:05 > 0:05:06It's just a wall.
0:05:06 > 0:05:08This was revolutionary.
0:05:08 > 0:05:12For the first time, a very English rural view was included
0:05:12 > 0:05:15as an integral part of the garden.
0:05:17 > 0:05:20I find William Kent a fascinating character.
0:05:20 > 0:05:22He was certainly no gardener.
0:05:22 > 0:05:25We know that he avoided visiting the site as far as he could
0:05:25 > 0:05:29and was notoriously careless on details of construction.
0:05:29 > 0:05:33He seems to have been a semi-literate, drunken Yorkshireman
0:05:33 > 0:05:36with a knack of smoozing the aristocracy.
0:05:36 > 0:05:43But I think he was also, on the evidence of his work here and at Stowe, touched with true greatness.
0:05:43 > 0:05:49This route takes you through the woods and down here into what is known as the Vale of Venus.
0:05:49 > 0:05:53That's obviously a beautiful, beautiful piece of landscaping but,
0:05:53 > 0:06:00for Kent, it was much, much more than that because it's full of allegories and references.
0:06:00 > 0:06:03Some of them architectural, like the shape of the cascade
0:06:03 > 0:06:08which had Italian references that only people who'd been on the Grand Tour would have known.
0:06:08 > 0:06:13And there's Venus herself, who is the Goddess of Gardens.
0:06:13 > 0:06:17And the few hundred people that would have come here
0:06:17 > 0:06:20would have known all that, they would have understood it.
0:06:20 > 0:06:24It was a sort of kind of theme park, in the way that we go and we know about Disney,
0:06:24 > 0:06:27we know about the films and we pick up the references.
0:06:27 > 0:06:29And, of course, for most people now, there's none of that.
0:06:29 > 0:06:33It doesn't mean anything beyond its beauty.
0:06:33 > 0:06:35Now I think that's fine, I think the beauty is enough.
0:06:35 > 0:06:40But there is one extra bonus that we get that they don't and of course that's the maturity.
0:06:49 > 0:06:54Now, I think, on a rainy overcast day in June,
0:06:54 > 0:07:00this is as beautiful as practically anything I've ever seen in the world.
0:07:00 > 0:07:03And a complete genius to take water and formalise it,
0:07:03 > 0:07:09and yet keep it sinuous, with the understory of the laurel and the box clipped,
0:07:09 > 0:07:13but massive in conception and in scale.
0:07:13 > 0:07:16The balance, the light, the simplicity.
0:07:16 > 0:07:21Made in 1740, and I tell you it's as modern as anything I've seen.
0:07:22 > 0:07:26Some of the layout of Rousham can be credited to Kent's contemporary,
0:07:26 > 0:07:30the Royal gardener, Charles Bridgeman,
0:07:30 > 0:07:33who laid out designs here some 20 years earlier.
0:07:33 > 0:07:38In Bridgeman's design, this natural stream was allowed to run free.
0:07:38 > 0:07:41But it was Kent's inspiration to formalise it,
0:07:41 > 0:07:43and to add the octagonal cold bath.
0:07:43 > 0:07:48And, like much in this garden, Kent's brilliance was to stimulate the senses as well as the mind.
0:07:57 > 0:08:04What this garden has, more than any other garden I've ever seen,
0:08:04 > 0:08:07is a sort of perfect greenness.
0:08:07 > 0:08:12The use of green and the layers of it, and the layers of light
0:08:12 > 0:08:16that filter through the green, is just sublime.
0:08:44 > 0:08:49Now this arcade of the Temple of Prinesti, as Kent called it,
0:08:49 > 0:08:51has alcoves and niches,
0:08:51 > 0:08:57and originally there was a statue in each of the niches, and a seat in each of these alcoves.
0:08:57 > 0:09:04The idea being, of course, that the visitor could sit and take in yet another fabulous view.
0:09:04 > 0:09:10And what you get from all these views, and in fact all these scenes, is that it's a theatre.
0:09:10 > 0:09:15The garden is like a stage set waiting for the actors to come.
0:09:15 > 0:09:18And, of course, you the visitor are the actors,
0:09:18 > 0:09:22and then the whole thing suddenly becomes alive and is made complete.
0:09:28 > 0:09:32Rousham is my favourite garden in England,
0:09:32 > 0:09:36and this visit has reinforced
0:09:36 > 0:09:40the fact that it is a staggering work.
0:09:40 > 0:09:42I think Kent was a genius, a true genius
0:09:42 > 0:09:45and he's right at the top of his art here,
0:09:45 > 0:09:49and it makes it one of the great gardens of the world.
0:09:49 > 0:09:54And he uses practically just one colour and some very simple ideas,
0:09:54 > 0:09:57and it proves the old adage - it's not really WHAT you do
0:09:57 > 0:09:59but HOW you do it that matters.
0:09:59 > 0:10:06And also, reinforces to me, that to a degree over the last 150/200 years,
0:10:06 > 0:10:09British gardens have been hijacked by flowers.
0:10:09 > 0:10:13We're obsessed by plants and their variety and their colour
0:10:13 > 0:10:17and how to grow them, and we've sort of lost the big picture.
0:10:17 > 0:10:20We've lost this sense of a big idea,
0:10:20 > 0:10:24expressed with panache and very simply.
0:10:24 > 0:10:29And if you want to find that again, well, you can do no better than come to Rousham.
0:10:33 > 0:10:37It is a wrench to leave, but I must move on and my next garden
0:10:37 > 0:10:42is another of the truly great ones, albeit very different from Rousham.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47It is the world-famous garden of Sissinghurst in Kent.
0:10:53 > 0:10:58Now, I've known this garden for 25 years and been visiting it regularly
0:10:58 > 0:11:02because the current occupant is a very old friend of mine.
0:11:02 > 0:11:07But it's been a National Trust garden for around 40 years,
0:11:07 > 0:11:13and it seems to me the National Trust have a particular hold on the British psyche.
0:11:13 > 0:11:17They completely understand our love for the past,
0:11:17 > 0:11:21particularly as manifested by houses and gardens.
0:11:21 > 0:11:27And, of course, Sissinghurst is the very best of the National Trust gardens.
0:11:29 > 0:11:32Sissinghurst represents and exemplifies
0:11:32 > 0:11:35all that the English aspire to in a garden,
0:11:35 > 0:11:40not least because it is the setting for the kind of aristocratic romps that the British so love.
0:11:40 > 0:11:42Gardening and sex!
0:11:42 > 0:11:45Days out don't come much better than that,
0:11:45 > 0:11:48especially if there is a cup of tea and a piece of cake thrown in too.
0:11:51 > 0:11:56Sissinghurst is a collection of ten distinct garden rooms,
0:11:56 > 0:12:00and it was begun in 1930 by the poet and novelist Vita Sackville-West
0:12:00 > 0:12:03and her husband Sir Harold Nicolson.
0:12:05 > 0:12:09This is the first of the garden rooms they designed, the Cottage Garden.
0:12:12 > 0:12:15The Cottage Garden here at Sissinghurst
0:12:15 > 0:12:18taps directly
0:12:18 > 0:12:24into almost every Englishman and woman's perception and desire for the perfect garden.
0:12:24 > 0:12:28It fulfils the need for charm,
0:12:28 > 0:12:33for a rural arcadia and above all for colour - a profusion of plants.
0:12:33 > 0:12:40But, of course, almost everything about this cottage garden is more than it seems.
0:12:40 > 0:12:42It's very carefully designed.
0:12:42 > 0:12:48There's a wide range of extraordinary plants that are very high maintenance.
0:12:48 > 0:12:50And, like everything else at Sissinghurst,
0:12:50 > 0:12:54there is so much more to it than first of all meets the eye.
0:12:59 > 0:13:02Sissinghurst is, of course, no cottage
0:13:02 > 0:13:05but a staggeringly beautiful Tudor castle.
0:13:05 > 0:13:07And while the traditional cottage garden
0:13:07 > 0:13:11was a haphazard jumble of flowers, fruit and lots of vegetables,
0:13:11 > 0:13:14despite the look of informality,
0:13:14 > 0:13:21the planting here is sophisticated and managed beyond the wildest dreams of any cottager.
0:13:21 > 0:13:25The job of maintaining all of Sissinghurst's ten garden rooms
0:13:25 > 0:13:28falls to the Head Gardener Alexis Datta,
0:13:28 > 0:13:34part of the Trust's large team in charge of curating this piece of our national heritage.
0:13:34 > 0:13:39How do you manage that sort of museum element of the garden?
0:13:39 > 0:13:41Well, I think that's quite a good question,
0:13:41 > 0:13:44cos "museum element" is just what I don't want it to be.
0:13:44 > 0:13:49It is a living thing, it moves and changes all the time - plants live and die.
0:13:49 > 0:13:51And so I don't want it to be at all museumy.
0:13:51 > 0:13:59And the idea is that it looks like the sort of idealised maybe version of what Harold and Vita made.
0:13:59 > 0:14:03So, we're forever changing things but we try and do it slightly, rather than in a big way.
0:14:03 > 0:14:07So it's a lot of change in order that it might stay roughly the same.
0:14:07 > 0:14:10- Yes. Exactly, yes.- Yeah.
0:14:10 > 0:14:16That said, in a historical garden like this, Alexis has to tread a fine line between
0:14:16 > 0:14:22the inevitability of change, and the public's desire to see the garden remain exactly the same.
0:14:23 > 0:14:27If Sissinghurst is one of the most famous gardens in the world,
0:14:27 > 0:14:30certainly the White Garden is the most famous part of Sissinghurst.
0:14:30 > 0:14:34It's iconic and has spawned 1,000 imitations,
0:14:34 > 0:14:35none of which are as good.
0:14:45 > 0:14:50The reason why the White Garden works so well, is actually not just to do with the white.
0:14:50 > 0:14:52The first thing is it's to do with the volume.
0:14:52 > 0:14:55It's got this wonderful high box hedges, and, in fact,
0:14:55 > 0:14:57they're much higher at this end.
0:14:57 > 0:15:02They get taller and taller as they go down, so that the overall level is constant,
0:15:02 > 0:15:10and that creates these spaces that are very satisfying and which then spill over with white flowers.
0:15:10 > 0:15:15And then the second thing is, it maybe called a white garden, but it's predominantly a green garden.
0:15:15 > 0:15:19There's all these different shades of green, which then
0:15:19 > 0:15:25just have a sprinkling of white and it's that very pure combination that makes it so satisfying.
0:15:26 > 0:15:31Today, while the National Trust may own and maintain Sissinghurst,
0:15:31 > 0:15:36Vita and Harold's grandson Adam Nicolson, lives here.
0:15:36 > 0:15:40Adam you grew up here, what was it like as a child? What was it like all those years ago?
0:15:40 > 0:15:43Well, you can never, you can never sort of take it seriously.
0:15:43 > 0:15:47You know, you don't know you're living in a shrine, really.
0:15:47 > 0:15:49So it's a great biking ground.
0:15:49 > 0:15:53I had a very good track that came through the arch there,
0:15:53 > 0:15:57down into the rose garden and then down to the herb garden.
0:15:57 > 0:16:01About 57 seconds I could do it, you know, if there weren't too many people there.
0:16:01 > 0:16:03- It's unimaginable.- No, I know.
0:16:03 > 0:16:06I'm quite tempted to do it again!
0:16:06 > 0:16:11No, it is, but, you know, I think in the '60s when I was a boy,
0:16:11 > 0:16:15probably 20, 25,000 people a year came.
0:16:15 > 0:16:22And now it's 150, 180, 200,000 even, so it's a completely different kettle of fish.
0:16:22 > 0:16:28Why do you think Sissinghurst has become such an icon,
0:16:28 > 0:16:32and such a sort of archetype of the ideal country home and garden?
0:16:32 > 0:16:35I think that now, you know, it's 70 years old now
0:16:35 > 0:16:39and you can look at it at the moment it was made in the '30s,
0:16:39 > 0:16:44when that great aristocratic sort of country house structure was actually falling apart
0:16:44 > 0:16:48under democracy, a tax regime, whatever you like.
0:16:48 > 0:16:54And this, in a way, completely intuitively, I think, models the end of a world.
0:16:54 > 0:17:01And that is enormously attractive to huge sections of the population
0:17:01 > 0:17:05as a sort of nostalgic loveliness.
0:17:15 > 0:17:22You know, one of the strange things that I've noticed today, is that although Sissinghurst
0:17:22 > 0:17:27is dominated by its architecture of both buildings and plants, people walk round it like this.
0:17:27 > 0:17:32They walk round with their heads down and they take pictures like that.
0:17:34 > 0:17:41And this exquisitely-orchestrated collection of plants changes its performance from season to season,
0:17:41 > 0:17:48even from day to day, but the story, locked in the past, is always the same.
0:17:48 > 0:17:50And perhaps only gardens can do that.
0:17:50 > 0:17:54Perhaps gardens can refresh the past,
0:17:54 > 0:17:59and yet nurture it in a way that nothing else can.
0:18:03 > 0:18:10Sissinghurst and Rousham are both gardens heavy with beauty and historical significance.
0:18:10 > 0:18:17But I scarcely have time to dwell on them, because immediately I'm off to catch the Eurostar to Paris.
0:18:19 > 0:18:22I knew both these English gardens of old
0:18:22 > 0:18:25but now I'm about to visit gardens that I have only seen in books.
0:18:25 > 0:18:30It's not just their horticultural beauty I am excited about...
0:18:30 > 0:18:31There we go.
0:18:31 > 0:18:37'..I also, want to discover what they can tell me about northern European culture.'
0:18:37 > 0:18:38Oh, look.
0:18:42 > 0:18:46I've been blasted effortlessly into Paris in under two hours,
0:18:46 > 0:18:47where I have to change trains
0:18:47 > 0:18:51in order to get to my first French garden, down in the Loire valley.
0:18:56 > 0:19:01I crossed Paris and changed trains with a quick spot of sightseeing on my way.
0:19:01 > 0:19:06As I headed to The Chateau of Villandry and its famous garden.
0:19:06 > 0:19:09Right in the heart of the Loire region,
0:19:09 > 0:19:13Villandry is one of the grandest of the area's many chateaux.
0:19:13 > 0:19:15I've wanted to see it for years because,
0:19:15 > 0:19:20laid out behind this beautiful building, is a famous garden that enthralled me
0:19:20 > 0:19:22from the very first time I heard about it.
0:19:26 > 0:19:30I was told that before I actually go into the garden itself,
0:19:30 > 0:19:35I should really go up and have a look at it from the top of the chateau's tower.
0:20:00 > 0:20:03I was going to tell you about the history and the significance
0:20:03 > 0:20:10and symbolism of this layout, and confidently came up here expecting to give a little lesson.
0:20:10 > 0:20:17And the honest truth is that I'm almost speechless
0:20:17 > 0:20:23at the incredible scale of execution, concept and above all,
0:20:23 > 0:20:26the sculptural quality.
0:20:26 > 0:20:28It's an immediate, visceral thing -
0:20:28 > 0:20:32you just don't get that from photographs or plans.
0:20:32 > 0:20:37This is a manipulation of spaces that is really exciting.
0:20:38 > 0:20:41The existing chateau was first built on the site
0:20:41 > 0:20:47of an earlier fortification by Jean le Breton, between 1532 and 1536.
0:20:47 > 0:20:54Le Breton had been an ambassador to Italy and the garden that he made at Villandry was ornate, extensive
0:20:54 > 0:20:58and drew on his experiences of Italian Renaissance gardens.
0:20:58 > 0:21:02The current owner of the chateau is Henri Carvallo.
0:21:02 > 0:21:08Now, Henri, perhaps you could explain to me the layout of the garden.
0:21:08 > 0:21:11I mean, for example this garden here,
0:21:11 > 0:21:13is clearly full of meaning, isn't it?
0:21:13 > 0:21:19Yes, of course. You have here the music garden on the other side of the moat.
0:21:19 > 0:21:24And just here, the Love Garden, which is really the extension of the main room of the chateau.
0:21:24 > 0:21:29But this walk that we're on now, this platform really,
0:21:29 > 0:21:33presumably is deliberately designed to look down on the gardens.
0:21:33 > 0:21:36Ah, of course, and it's a general principle of all the
0:21:36 > 0:21:42gardens in Villandry is that they are supposed to be seen from above first.
0:21:42 > 0:21:45The beauty of this garden,
0:21:45 > 0:21:48is mostly in the structure and in the geometry,
0:21:48 > 0:21:50rather than in the content of the frame.
0:21:50 > 0:21:57In 1754, the entire formal Renaissance garden was ripped out
0:21:57 > 0:22:02and replaced with an English-style landscape park like Rousham.
0:22:02 > 0:22:06In 1906, Henri's great grandparents bought the chateau
0:22:06 > 0:22:10and began the process of restoring the garden to its Renaissance glory.
0:22:13 > 0:22:16Quite a responsibility for you now.
0:22:16 > 0:22:20It's always very nice and interesting to continue to pursue the work
0:22:20 > 0:22:25of your ancestor, and I'm the fourth generation so, it's going on quite well.
0:22:25 > 0:22:30And also it brings me always a lot of joy to receive visitors.
0:22:30 > 0:22:33Now, this is a dramatic change.
0:22:33 > 0:22:35Tell me about this area, Henri.
0:22:35 > 0:22:38This is the water garden.
0:22:38 > 0:22:43This was created after plants of the 18th Century, and so the water garden
0:22:43 > 0:22:48which is centred around a nice water mirror in the side of the river
0:22:48 > 0:22:52is really, I think, the most peaceful place of the garden.
0:22:58 > 0:23:01So far, I have only viewed the garden from above.
0:23:01 > 0:23:05Now I want to go down and get right in amongst it.
0:23:07 > 0:23:11Down at ground level in the music garden, you can really
0:23:11 > 0:23:15hardly make out the pattern except for where the lavender marks it.
0:23:15 > 0:23:22So you have this extraordinary great slab of box hedge.
0:23:22 > 0:23:25Now, I assume they would use this machine that they're using
0:23:25 > 0:23:28for cutting the hornbeam hedge at the back
0:23:28 > 0:23:33to get out over the box and cut it, because I couldn't think how else they did it, and I asked Henri.
0:23:33 > 0:23:37And he said, "No, actually what they do is that they part the box
0:23:37 > 0:23:42"where two plants meet in here, and then just carefully walk through."
0:23:42 > 0:23:48And wade out thigh deep in box, cut what they can and then move on,
0:23:48 > 0:23:50and then just push it all back together again.
0:23:50 > 0:23:57And that's sort of charmingly human and sort of amateur in this
0:23:57 > 0:24:00incredibly impressive professional set-up.
0:24:07 > 0:24:10The lowest terrace of Villandry
0:24:10 > 0:24:14is the potager and actually this is what I wanted to come and see.
0:24:14 > 0:24:18This is why I've chosen it as one of my 80 gardens,
0:24:18 > 0:24:21and I've been longing to come and see it for 20 years now.
0:24:24 > 0:24:27Potager is taken from the French for soup - potage -
0:24:27 > 0:24:32and essentially the garden grows the ingredients to make soup, including vegetables and herbs.
0:24:32 > 0:24:39But there are also flowers and fruit and all is set in an intricately formal geometric pattern
0:24:39 > 0:24:42delineated with box hedging.
0:24:42 > 0:24:44The scale is breathtaking.
0:24:44 > 0:24:52In two annual sowings they grow over 80,000 vegetable plants and another 30,000 of flowers.
0:24:52 > 0:24:56My visit is at the cusp of two seasons, so it is comparatively empty
0:24:56 > 0:25:00but it is easy to see why this is the most famous potager in the world.
0:25:03 > 0:25:09Well, I've fulfilled a lifetime's ambition to visit Villandry and I'm not remotely disappointed, in fact,
0:25:09 > 0:25:14I'm overwhelmed at how it's exceeded my expectations.
0:25:14 > 0:25:19But the surprising thing has been that the reason for this pilgrimage -
0:25:19 > 0:25:21the potager, the vegetables -
0:25:21 > 0:25:24has NOT been the thing that's blown me away.
0:25:24 > 0:25:30I had no idea that the rest of the garden was so beautiful, and so magnificent.
0:25:30 > 0:25:36It's almost land art, and yet it's a historical monument, made with such
0:25:36 > 0:25:40a degree of generosity and big mindedness.
0:25:40 > 0:25:42So, put all that together in a garden,
0:25:42 > 0:25:49and you have what is quite frankly an exhilarating package, and I've absolutely adored it.
0:25:54 > 0:25:59I'm heading off now to another garden I have long wanted to see,
0:25:59 > 0:26:02made by one of France's most famous painters.
0:26:02 > 0:26:07This means going back north of Paris to Normandy.
0:26:12 > 0:26:17This next garden is about as different from Villandry as could be imagined
0:26:17 > 0:26:23and it's essentially modern, in concept at least, because it's over 100 years old now.
0:26:23 > 0:26:29And it belongs to the painter Monet, at Giverny.
0:26:34 > 0:26:37The queues to see the garden are building up
0:26:37 > 0:26:40even though it is not yet officially open
0:26:40 > 0:26:44and I have been granted a quick look round before the public are allowed in.
0:26:51 > 0:26:56Giverny has become one of the most famous gardens in Europe, if not the world,
0:26:56 > 0:27:02and it's visited by up to half a million people in the seven months of the year that it is open.
0:27:02 > 0:27:09Monet was obsessed with this garden and painted it continuously for 40 years until his death in 1926.
0:27:09 > 0:27:12It is the archetype of the creative relationship
0:27:12 > 0:27:14between painting and gardening
0:27:14 > 0:27:18and every aspect of the garden is driven by colour and light.
0:27:22 > 0:27:25It appears like there's a sort of pair of borders, huge borders,
0:27:25 > 0:27:28going up either side this path.
0:27:28 > 0:27:35In fact, they're made up of a succession of small raised beds,
0:27:35 > 0:27:38each one with its own mini theme,
0:27:38 > 0:27:43each mounded up in a slightly chaotic, almost arbitrary pattern.
0:27:43 > 0:27:47But then you start to notice that the colours are working together.
0:27:47 > 0:27:51Now, it's been said that these are like an artists' palette in the way they're laid out,
0:27:51 > 0:27:56but it seems more to me like the way that a picture is built up, a painting.
0:27:56 > 0:28:00The overall effect has a sort of general theme,
0:28:00 > 0:28:04but then individually you start to look at the way it's put together
0:28:04 > 0:28:08and the whole series of little mini events happening, to make the bigger picture.
0:28:13 > 0:28:17This is a huge cultural change, it really might as well be another country.
0:28:17 > 0:28:24I've left the language of formality, of green layers and plains,
0:28:24 > 0:28:28and come to a country where the currency is colour.
0:28:28 > 0:28:33But actually as I walk around, it's clear there are surprising connections.
0:28:33 > 0:28:38The layout here is very grid-like, it's formal.
0:28:38 > 0:28:43It's just it's fuzzy. It's a fuzzy structure and a fuzzy framework,
0:28:43 > 0:28:47in order that colour can be saturated into it.
0:28:49 > 0:28:56This section of the garden, what was the original cider orchard, is only half of it.
0:28:56 > 0:29:00Ten years after buying the house, Monet bought another plot of land
0:29:00 > 0:29:04over the road, specifically to make his famous lily ponds.
0:29:06 > 0:29:12Jan Huntley from the Claude Monet Foundation has offered to guide me round them.
0:29:17 > 0:29:21Monet painted these lily ponds with a kind of simmering mania.
0:29:21 > 0:29:24He would work on up to 50 different canvases at any one time,
0:29:24 > 0:29:32moving from one to the other as he tried to capture the specific light at that precise moment of the day.
0:29:32 > 0:29:38But the Claude Monet Foundation has more than just the constantly changing light to worry about today.
0:29:38 > 0:29:44You now have, what, upward of half a million visitors a year?
0:29:44 > 0:29:48- Exactly. Yes.- They must impose problems and restrictions
0:29:48 > 0:29:51that Monet never had to deal with, and couldn't have dealt with.
0:29:51 > 0:29:57Monet's riverbanks were far more grassy, as you can see over there.
0:29:57 > 0:30:03We've planted really close to the edges, simply to prevent the tourists from stepping over.
0:30:03 > 0:30:06It's not only that, it's also public pressure.
0:30:06 > 0:30:12The public expect to see a very famous garden in perfect condition.
0:30:12 > 0:30:15Now you know that that's not possible, which does mean that
0:30:15 > 0:30:19we have a lot of work that has to be done very early in the morning.
0:30:19 > 0:30:25Literally on Mondays, the gardeners come in and anything that is no longer in good shape, disappears
0:30:25 > 0:30:27and we put something else in.
0:30:27 > 0:30:29I mean, what's the basic philosophy.
0:30:29 > 0:30:32Do you think, what would Monet have done under the same situation?
0:30:32 > 0:30:37Or do you say well, we have to make a decision for better or worse?
0:30:40 > 0:30:44We...have to make a decision for better or for worse,
0:30:44 > 0:30:47and the idea of what would Monet have done
0:30:47 > 0:30:54does not come into line because Monet would never have had so many visitors.
0:30:54 > 0:30:56He was a very private man.
0:31:17 > 0:31:20Well, that was really interesting.
0:31:20 > 0:31:23I've come away with mixed feelings
0:31:23 > 0:31:29because, clearly, if there's a garden that you've been dying to see for a long time,
0:31:29 > 0:31:31it's great to go there
0:31:31 > 0:31:35but you risk challenging your expectations.
0:31:35 > 0:31:39It's a tricky time of year, in between, and they've had some terrible weather so,
0:31:39 > 0:31:43not the best time to judge it for its colour.
0:31:43 > 0:31:48But what it did make me realise was that unlike any other garden I've seen,
0:31:48 > 0:31:52that garden was created as part of the creative process towards painting.
0:31:52 > 0:31:58It's a means to an end, however seriously Monet took the horticulture.
0:31:58 > 0:32:05And now, they've got the job of maintaining that garden in a deadly professional and serious way,
0:32:05 > 0:32:09but without that impetus of a single figure creating something from it.
0:32:09 > 0:32:13Sissinghurst still resonates with Harold and Vita's spirit
0:32:13 > 0:32:18but Giverney seems emptier, less a living garden and more a tribute to Claude Monet.
0:32:22 > 0:32:27Anyway it is time now to move on from Giverney and France.
0:32:27 > 0:32:28Bonjour.
0:32:28 > 0:32:30Merci.
0:32:30 > 0:32:33INDISTINCT SPEECH
0:32:35 > 0:32:39The third country in this five-nation jaunt is Belgium,
0:32:39 > 0:32:42and a garden just outside the city of Antwerp.
0:32:50 > 0:32:55I bought this little book about eight years ago, just speculatively.
0:32:55 > 0:32:58I took it home and opened it up and was blown away.
0:32:58 > 0:33:03I love the pictures of the gardens inside which seem to combine
0:33:03 > 0:33:07formality and tradition, and yet something that was completely
0:33:07 > 0:33:12innovative and exactly chimed with what I love about gardens.
0:33:12 > 0:33:18And it's called Le Jean And Le Jacques Wirtz, and it's the reason I'm on this train now to Antwerp
0:33:18 > 0:33:22to meet Jacques Wirtz after all these years.
0:33:25 > 0:33:28Jacques Wirtz is a designer who straddles the divide
0:33:28 > 0:33:32between the traditional European garden aesthetic, and contemporary garden style.
0:33:32 > 0:33:38And he is a fully paid-up hero of mine, so rather than visit one of his clients' gardens,
0:33:38 > 0:33:41of which there are many all over Europe,
0:33:41 > 0:33:44I went to meet him at his home, to see his own garden.
0:34:04 > 0:34:09I've seen pictures of this, but I had no idea that it was so long.
0:34:13 > 0:34:16This four-acre garden was once the walled garden of a great estate,
0:34:16 > 0:34:19and the paths were lined with box hedging.
0:34:19 > 0:34:23But by 1970, when Jacques bought his house, originally the gardener's cottage,
0:34:23 > 0:34:2730 years of neglect had reduced the hedges to an overgrown, gappy sprawl.
0:34:27 > 0:34:30Rather than ripping them out and starting afresh,
0:34:30 > 0:34:33he used this raw material to make his cloud hedges,
0:34:33 > 0:34:39transforming them into one of the great horticultural features of the 20th century.
0:34:43 > 0:34:46In so many gardens that you visit
0:34:46 > 0:34:50there's a style that you can latch onto,
0:34:50 > 0:34:54and you understand it and you appreciate it, and that explains the garden.
0:34:54 > 0:34:57What you have here is complete fluidity.
0:34:57 > 0:35:01You've got the layout of a formal garden, you've got nursery plants.
0:35:01 > 0:35:08There's wonderful flowers, there are vegetables, all growing without boundaries.
0:35:08 > 0:35:14It challenges all preconceptions, but actually the elements are completely familiar.
0:35:21 > 0:35:25What you've got here are these great specimens -
0:35:25 > 0:35:29holly, box, some yew round the corner, like trees in a wood.
0:35:29 > 0:35:33I mean, there's no attempt to make it like a garden.
0:35:33 > 0:35:35And it's because they're stored.
0:35:35 > 0:35:40This is, to me, like a stone mason's yard or maybe an attic,
0:35:40 > 0:35:44full of marvellous things just waiting to go.
0:35:44 > 0:35:51And it's got all the ingredients of a formal garden, but none of the self-consciousness
0:35:51 > 0:35:54and it's that that makes it so magical.
0:35:57 > 0:36:00They say you should never meet your heroes
0:36:00 > 0:36:03and I was a little nervous before meeting Jacques Wirtz.
0:36:03 > 0:36:07But there was also much I wanted to ask him.
0:36:07 > 0:36:09Did you intend
0:36:09 > 0:36:13to make a garden here or to use it as a nursery?
0:36:13 > 0:36:19Well, my intention was not to make a garden,
0:36:19 > 0:36:26to stock plants here for use in our firm, for planting outside.
0:36:26 > 0:36:32But presumably this hedge here behind you now, that was already there and you clipped it.
0:36:32 > 0:36:35Yes. But not only large shapes.
0:36:35 > 0:36:40Why did you reform it in this cloud formation,
0:36:40 > 0:36:43rather than in straight lines in the European tradition?
0:36:43 > 0:36:48Yes, this was a inspiration of the moment,
0:36:48 > 0:36:52not to go back to this traditional way and to make
0:36:52 > 0:36:54it like...
0:36:54 > 0:37:00clouds and what the French name - moutonnement, moutonnement.
0:37:00 > 0:37:03Like sheep, you know?
0:37:04 > 0:37:08Some people make copies of this in their garden
0:37:08 > 0:37:15and if you do that you have to, you need to do it on a big scale, otherwise it is, you know,
0:37:15 > 0:37:16it's not good.
0:37:16 > 0:37:20Does this garden still please you and give you pleasure?
0:37:20 > 0:37:22Yes. Oh, yes, it's very satisfying.
0:37:22 > 0:37:27For me, it is a pleasure to every morning to take my breakfast here and
0:37:27 > 0:37:35to look at the garden and to make the short walk to the greenhouse, and so on. No, no, I am very happy.
0:37:35 > 0:37:39Often this is paradise for me. Yes.
0:37:46 > 0:37:50Now, it's obvious that I absolutely loved this garden,
0:37:50 > 0:37:55and I suppose it ranks as one of the great experiences of my life.
0:37:55 > 0:37:58You know, one of the sort of fantastic artistic experiences,
0:37:58 > 0:38:01like going to a film that blows you away,
0:38:01 > 0:38:04or reading a novel that changes your life.
0:38:04 > 0:38:09And what really seems to be special about it, is the way that space is
0:38:09 > 0:38:15sculpted into these extraordinary beautiful objects made out of air,
0:38:15 > 0:38:17and contained by plants.
0:38:17 > 0:38:20And because the plants are living and changing and have to be clipped,
0:38:20 > 0:38:26and also that the whole garden is so fluid, it has fantastic dynamism.
0:38:26 > 0:38:32And that balance between sort of poetic delicacy and human energy
0:38:32 > 0:38:34seems to be just perfect.
0:38:36 > 0:38:40The exhilaration of that experience has more than compensated for the slight disappointment of Giverny,
0:38:40 > 0:38:44and I am ready to move on to the next stage of this journey,
0:38:44 > 0:38:48and the only other garden on this trip that I have visited before.
0:38:50 > 0:38:53From Belgium, I catch another train to the Netherlands
0:38:53 > 0:38:59and back 300 years to the Royal garden of Het Loo in Apeldoorn.
0:39:04 > 0:39:10The last time I came here was in 1994, when a full restoration of the garden had just been completed.
0:39:10 > 0:39:16I have returned because the garden is the best living history lesson that I know.
0:39:25 > 0:39:27The garden was made in the middle of a vast forest,
0:39:27 > 0:39:30which was pretty much untamed.
0:39:30 > 0:39:35Now, at the end of the 17th century, forest or wilderness of any kind
0:39:35 > 0:39:40that wasn't being used for productive purposes, was seen as hostile.
0:39:40 > 0:39:46There was no romantic idea that it was a beautiful natural world, it was effectively the enemy.
0:39:46 > 0:39:51So to make a garden in the middle of that was an expression of man's domination over nature.
0:39:51 > 0:39:56William of Orange and his young English wife Mary came here in 1684
0:39:56 > 0:40:00and set about creating a palace and garden in a high Baroque style
0:40:00 > 0:40:04that above all expressed formality and control.
0:40:04 > 0:40:08The Baroque evolved from the earlier Renaissance style but was more elaborate, and more theatrical.
0:40:08 > 0:40:14Then in 1689, William and Mary were invited to take over the English crown from Mary's father,
0:40:14 > 0:40:18the Catholic James II, and they moved to England.
0:40:18 > 0:40:22Bringing with them a whole range of Dutch influences,
0:40:22 > 0:40:26but none that was to be more profound, than in gardens.
0:40:26 > 0:40:30So the garden here at Het Loo which was only five years old at that point,
0:40:30 > 0:40:36proved to have a real and lasting effect on the landscape of Britain.
0:40:37 > 0:40:44In fact, detailed aspects of Het Loo, like these golden swans, found their way as lead casts, to Rousham,
0:40:44 > 0:40:50but it was the general Dutch influence that was soon seen in gardens right across Britain.
0:40:58 > 0:41:02These narrow borders that ribbon the great parterres,
0:41:02 > 0:41:05are not really flower borders as we understand them at all.
0:41:05 > 0:41:10They're more like our displays of specimens,
0:41:10 > 0:41:12which is why you just get one plant in a row,
0:41:12 > 0:41:17spaced quite widely apart by modern standards, all the way along.
0:41:17 > 0:41:22And the idea was just to enjoy them as they came, individually.
0:41:22 > 0:41:27Much more, in fact, like china which, around the time of Het Loo
0:41:27 > 0:41:32was collected obsessively in a cabinet or on a mantelpiece.
0:41:36 > 0:41:40'I met the curator Ben Groen and walked round the garden.
0:41:41 > 0:41:45'Although this is Baroque, and Villandry is high Renaissance,
0:41:45 > 0:41:49'the similarity between the two gardens is apparent in broad content if not in detail.'
0:41:49 > 0:41:54And like Villandry, Het Loo shared the indignity of the formal garden being swept away
0:41:54 > 0:41:57and replaced with a landscape park.
0:41:57 > 0:42:03From 1807, William and Mary's garden was lost, buried in the sandy soil.
0:42:03 > 0:42:10But in 1970, work began to recreate the original Baroque garden, based on detailed plans and archaeology.
0:42:12 > 0:42:17What really strikes me about this is that it looks
0:42:17 > 0:42:22brand spanking new, which of course is how it would have looked
0:42:22 > 0:42:28in about 1710, or 1720, ie about 20 years after it was made.
0:42:28 > 0:42:31Is that deliberate? Are you trying to keep it looking new?
0:42:31 > 0:42:36Yes. What we want to give is a frozen image of 1700.
0:42:38 > 0:42:44Man is master in nature, that is the message probably sent out at the end of the 17th century.
0:42:44 > 0:42:46At that time it was the first...
0:42:46 > 0:42:50feeling that, "Yes, we can get it,
0:42:50 > 0:42:52"we can master nature."
0:42:52 > 0:42:53And now we know we can.
0:42:53 > 0:42:56Do you know how many miles of hedging there is?
0:42:56 > 0:42:58It's about 30 kilometres.
0:42:58 > 0:43:01And that is quite a distance.
0:43:01 > 0:43:08They start in the beginning of April and they go until the end of June,
0:43:08 > 0:43:14and that means four gardeners are basically the whole day is clipping.
0:43:14 > 0:43:18And they go on and they go on.
0:43:21 > 0:43:25This garden is most certainly NOT low maintenance.
0:43:25 > 0:43:28And to one side of the house, through the Queen's Garden,
0:43:28 > 0:43:32is what must be the mother and father of all hedge trimming jobs.
0:43:37 > 0:43:44This is the burso, which is my favourite piece of the garden.
0:43:44 > 0:43:48The idea of a burso is to create a framework out of wood,
0:43:48 > 0:43:50and in this case massive framework,
0:43:50 > 0:43:54and then clad it in hornbeam from the outside, which
0:43:54 > 0:43:59is then trimmed so it looks like a solid structure from the outside, and yet light filters through.
0:43:59 > 0:44:05And the reason for it was so that the Queen could walk protected from the glare of the summer sun.
0:44:05 > 0:44:11And the effect is to have this green light filtering through to make,
0:44:11 > 0:44:18I think, one of the most magical places in any garden in the world, because you're inside the light.
0:44:18 > 0:44:22You're inside the structure of the hedge and it's fragile,
0:44:22 > 0:44:27and yet, of course, amazingly strong and I adore it.
0:44:27 > 0:44:32But actually whether I like it or not, is not the point about Het Loo.
0:44:37 > 0:44:43Unlike any of the other gardens on this trip, the critical thing about Het Loo is that NOT allowed to age.
0:44:43 > 0:44:49It is a time machine, deliberately held, bright, fresh and new at the year 1700.
0:44:52 > 0:44:56And, in garden terms, what you have here at Het Loo is the mould
0:44:56 > 0:45:02that 40 years later, William Kent was to shatter at Rousham.
0:45:09 > 0:45:13Leaving Het Loo it's time to pop onto another train back to Amsterdam.
0:45:17 > 0:45:22I've got a few pictures on here of the next garden
0:45:22 > 0:45:24that I'm visiting.
0:45:24 > 0:45:29Now it's designed by a man called Piet Oudolf who I've met a couple of times in England.
0:45:29 > 0:45:32He did a gold medal winning garden at Chelsea a few years ago.
0:45:32 > 0:45:39And he's one of the leading exponents of, what you might call the new perennial garden,
0:45:39 > 0:45:42which uses grasses to a very great degree.
0:45:42 > 0:45:46And this garden, which I've never seen before,
0:45:46 > 0:45:49is supposed to be a really good example
0:45:49 > 0:45:54of a modern European garden.
0:46:27 > 0:46:31I mean, clearly it goes without saying that this is a highly designed garden.
0:46:31 > 0:46:34It's a designer set piece.
0:46:34 > 0:46:37None the worse for that, that's not a criticism.
0:46:37 > 0:46:43And based around this slab of water, which I guess if it wasn't starting to rain rather uncomfortably,
0:46:43 > 0:46:47we've dodged the weather most of this week, would reflect the sky.
0:46:47 > 0:46:51And then you'd have these very crisp lines.
0:46:51 > 0:46:59I like the way that the garden is sort of anchored by great slabs of water and bed and hedge,
0:46:59 > 0:47:02and then gently softens.
0:47:05 > 0:47:10For the first time on this trip, I'm in a garden where everything has been designed from scratch,
0:47:10 > 0:47:14and luckily Piet Oudolf has agreed to come along and talk to me about his work.
0:47:19 > 0:47:24Do you think there is a sort of European, particularly a northern European
0:47:24 > 0:47:27gardening language or style?
0:47:27 > 0:47:30More in the planting I suppose nowadays.
0:47:30 > 0:47:33It, er...
0:47:33 > 0:47:39It's more about sustainability, you know, the word
0:47:39 > 0:47:43it's almost fashionable, but we try to create gardens that last longer,
0:47:43 > 0:47:45try to find the plants that work better.
0:47:45 > 0:47:49Now here you've used grasses to huge effect,
0:47:49 > 0:47:51is that part of that process?
0:47:51 > 0:47:54No, grasses, I think, are part of the way I like to work.
0:47:54 > 0:47:59I think it creates a sort of spontaneity, a sort of natural holistic look,
0:47:59 > 0:48:01and that was how it all started.
0:48:01 > 0:48:08But, on the other hand, grasses tend to need less water and tend to be easy if you use the right ones,
0:48:08 > 0:48:11and they match very well with the plants I like.
0:48:11 > 0:48:13Which plants do you like?
0:48:13 > 0:48:17Plants that look very, come very close to the natural species.
0:48:17 > 0:48:25And that's why I like grasses so much because I don't like big flowers and over cultivated plants.
0:48:25 > 0:48:31Where do you see garden design taking us in the future?
0:48:31 > 0:48:36I think we can find a way that we can, where ecology meets design.
0:48:36 > 0:48:41So you can look for the plants that grow well on the site where you are busy.
0:48:41 > 0:48:49And we don't want people to water three times a day so it is very important for the future.
0:48:59 > 0:49:05I took a little bit of a punt with this garden because although I'd heard it was really good,
0:49:05 > 0:49:10you never really know with a private garden.
0:49:10 > 0:49:13But I'm jolly glad I did come because I think it IS good.
0:49:13 > 0:49:17Remember, we're only about half an hour from the middle of Amsterdam,
0:49:17 > 0:49:23and yet you have a garden that's private, it's domestic and yet it's open out to the landscape.
0:49:23 > 0:49:28And, I'm sure that's at the heart of the future of gardening.
0:49:28 > 0:49:33It must relate to the surroundings, and relate to the realities of modern life.
0:49:33 > 0:49:36So on every level, it's been a really good trip.
0:49:46 > 0:49:50I've come to the end of the familiar aspects of Europe
0:49:50 > 0:49:55and gardens that I've certainly known of, if not actually visited before.
0:49:55 > 0:49:58But before I finish, I want to go out of my European comfort zone,
0:49:58 > 0:50:04and go as far north as possible where there still might be a garden to see.
0:50:11 > 0:50:16So, for the final stage, I take a plane for the first time on this trip
0:50:16 > 0:50:20to go to the island of Tromso in the far north of Norway.
0:50:26 > 0:50:31And after weeks of constant rain and grey cloud, I find bright sunshine,
0:50:31 > 0:50:39all day AND all night because at this time of year up here, in midsummer, the sun never sets.
0:50:41 > 0:50:43This is taking some getting used to.
0:50:45 > 0:50:51I've come one plane hop to another country and it really does feel like another world.
0:50:51 > 0:50:55Here we are with snow on the mountains, the brightest sunshine you can imagine.
0:50:55 > 0:50:58I mean, it's just almost impossible to see without dark glasses.
0:50:58 > 0:51:05It's hot, much hotter than it was in mainland, grey rainy Europe,
0:51:05 > 0:51:06and there's perpetual light.
0:51:06 > 0:51:10It's light all night long it's as bright as this.
0:51:10 > 0:51:18And yet I know that there is the flipside, which is this perpetual darkness in the middle of winter.
0:51:18 > 0:51:20And although it's very, very different,
0:51:20 > 0:51:24what it feels like is all those elements of northern Europe,
0:51:24 > 0:51:28stretched out to the very limits that they'll go.
0:51:32 > 0:51:37I have to pinch myself to remember that Tromso is in fact 200 miles
0:51:37 > 0:51:42inside the Arctic Circle and is covered by snow for six months of the year.
0:51:42 > 0:51:46I am fascinated to discover what it is like to garden with these extremes of light and dark
0:51:46 > 0:51:49and of summer and winter climates.
0:51:49 > 0:51:52If ever gardening was on the edge, it is so up here.
0:51:55 > 0:51:59But as I come into the world's most northerly botanic garden
0:51:59 > 0:52:03through its woodland park, it is clear that the restricted growing season has surprising benefits.
0:52:03 > 0:52:09Everything here has a freshness like the very best of an early English May day,
0:52:09 > 0:52:12but bathed in intense midsummer light,
0:52:12 > 0:52:16which is a glorious combination and I have never seen it before.
0:52:27 > 0:52:31This is a complete surprise.
0:52:31 > 0:52:34Not quite sure what I had expected, actually, but it wasn't this.
0:52:34 > 0:52:41It was much more a question of harsh weather and tiny plants clinging to the rocks.
0:52:41 > 0:52:47Yet...I've walked through this marvellous flower-filled wood.
0:52:47 > 0:52:52The hedgerows and the sides of the roads are smothered with flowers.
0:52:52 > 0:52:55And here you come into the botanic garden
0:52:55 > 0:53:02with bright colour and there are the mountains covered in snow and the fjord...
0:53:02 > 0:53:06which is a delightful surprise.
0:53:09 > 0:53:15The Tromso Botanic Gardens houses a wide range of alpine species from around the world,
0:53:15 > 0:53:21collected into geographic groups and planted in amongst the boulders and rocks throughout the garden.
0:53:21 > 0:53:28These cover a surprising range of shapes and sizes from the positively lusty to the minute and delicate.
0:53:28 > 0:53:32What they all have in common is their adaptation to these surroundings
0:53:32 > 0:53:38and all are completely at home in this most extreme of garden environments.
0:53:39 > 0:53:45Arve Elvebakk is the curator here at Tromso and he specialises in Arctic plants.
0:53:50 > 0:53:53One of the extraordinary things, you're open I believe, all the time.
0:53:53 > 0:53:56Yes. All days of the year.
0:53:56 > 0:53:58And not just all days, but all day too.
0:53:58 > 0:54:01You can come here at two, three in the morning, can't you?
0:54:01 > 0:54:04- Yes, yes. People do.- Really?
0:54:04 > 0:54:06That's quite extraordinary.
0:54:06 > 0:54:09How is it possible to make a garden so far north?
0:54:09 > 0:54:12Well, it's thanks to the Gulf Stream.
0:54:12 > 0:54:15We are north of the Arctic Circle but we don't have an Arctic climate.
0:54:15 > 0:54:19We are surrounded by forests, and I have visited Greenland at the same latitude,
0:54:19 > 0:54:22and it's like a totally different world.
0:54:22 > 0:54:27They have two, three degrees in summer and ice and polar bears and walrus,
0:54:27 > 0:54:30and are far to the north of the forest.
0:54:30 > 0:54:35So if we had changed place, if the Gulf Stream would stop,
0:54:35 > 0:54:36we would have a problem.
0:54:36 > 0:54:40There is talk of that happening, isn't there, with climate change?
0:54:40 > 0:54:44Yes. They discuss if there is a balance and the oceanographers say
0:54:44 > 0:54:47that, "Oh, we think it will last at least for 100 years or more."
0:54:47 > 0:54:49So I hope they are right.
0:54:51 > 0:54:55The warmth of the Gulf Stream means that it's not just alpine plants
0:54:55 > 0:54:58that can thrive in this furthest outreach of Europe.
0:54:58 > 0:55:02Brynhild Morkved is working on a collection of more familiar plants,
0:55:02 > 0:55:05mainly gathered from local households
0:55:05 > 0:55:09and these tell a unique gardening story from northern Norway.
0:55:11 > 0:55:16This is the green cultural heritage of northern Norway.
0:55:16 > 0:55:20The plants that the old women had had in their gardens for...
0:55:20 > 0:55:22hundreds of years.
0:55:22 > 0:55:25The colour of this ranunculus is incredible.
0:55:25 > 0:55:28I mean, these bright golden buttons.
0:55:28 > 0:55:32Yes. 50 years ago, you could find it in different gardens in the whole of Norway
0:55:32 > 0:55:37but now it has disappeared from all the other places.
0:55:37 > 0:55:40- But why has it disappeared? - It's a field form of a weed.
0:55:40 > 0:55:44- Yes, a weed. They perhaps have cleared it away. - They just weed it out.
0:55:44 > 0:55:49Yes. So today, that is the only old...collection
0:55:49 > 0:55:53we have in whole of Norway of that plant.
0:55:53 > 0:55:58It must be incredibly difficult to garden in this climate.
0:55:58 > 0:56:04People from other places of the world, they think nothing grows in the north.
0:56:04 > 0:56:09I also thought that when I come to Tromso, and then it was very big
0:56:09 > 0:56:12flowers and very beautiful, so... And I think
0:56:12 > 0:56:17people that are at the border for growing, they want to try to...
0:56:17 > 0:56:22"Oh, I want to try this plant and I want to try this plant."
0:56:23 > 0:56:27I confess that botanic gardens don't always thrill me,
0:56:27 > 0:56:30but to put plants in context and to see them growing
0:56:30 > 0:56:37in their natural habitat, especially one as extreme as this, is really inspiring.
0:56:37 > 0:56:41And it feels appropriate to finish this journey as far from where I began as possible,
0:56:41 > 0:56:47as though any further and the very notion of a garden would fall off the edge of the world.
0:56:47 > 0:56:51I've come up this hill just outside Tromso,
0:56:51 > 0:56:57literally to give myself a little bit of distance on this trip and to take stock.
0:56:57 > 0:57:03Because, down there is this town, 200 miles into the Arctic Circle.
0:57:03 > 0:57:05Behind me is the midnight sun.
0:57:05 > 0:57:08It literally is midnight, this bright light
0:57:08 > 0:57:13which is the sun skirting over the Arctic and beyond there's nothing.
0:57:13 > 0:57:16No more gardens, hardly any more people at all.
0:57:16 > 0:57:19Just the frozen waste for most of the year.
0:57:21 > 0:57:25I began this journey wondering how gardens can best serve history.
0:57:25 > 0:57:30Certainly, gardens can bring the past alive in the most vivid way possible
0:57:30 > 0:57:33because, unlike a building or a painting,
0:57:33 > 0:57:37the components are constantly changing.
0:57:37 > 0:57:40But, as my journey progressed, I began to realise that whatever
0:57:40 > 0:57:45their history, however powerful the cult of personality behind the garden
0:57:45 > 0:57:51the gardens of Northern Europe seemed all to be shaped most by light or the lack of it.
0:57:51 > 0:57:59How the Northern European gardens sculpt, reflect, harness or play with the available light
0:57:59 > 0:58:03is the creative bond that runs down through all the years.
0:58:07 > 0:58:11And to come here, a place of perpetual sunlight in the summer,
0:58:11 > 0:58:16and its flipside, perpetual dark in the winter,
0:58:16 > 0:58:23takes that northern European obsession with light to its extremes, and I can go no further.
0:58:28 > 0:58:30Join me next time as I travel east
0:58:30 > 0:58:35to experience the diverse cultural influences of South East Asia
0:58:35 > 0:58:38on a quest to find the real tropical garden.
0:59:02 > 0:59:05Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:59:05 > 0:59:08E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk