'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. Today, it 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 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
★
Information from the University of York