May Meeting 2016 - The Capable Mr Brown

Lancelot "Capability" Brown.
Portrait held at the York Museums Trust.

Mr Russell Bowes presented a talk entitled "The Capable Mr. Brown" at our May meeting, focusing on the man himself and illustrating his talk with the gardens that he created.

"Capability" Brown - as gardeners, who hasn't heard of him, but how many could effortlessly state that his given name was Lancelot, or that he lived from 1716-1783?  We all know that he created great landscapes of lawns, trees and lakes for rich landowners to see from their houses, but how much does his work matter now, and what can we learn from it?  Lancelot "Capability" Brown captured the feelings of a time that was turning away from the rigid controls of life in Europe and in society as a whole, replacing formal and controlled parterres and plantings with a more laid back and natural style which we now take for granted.   In doing so, he essentially defined the view that we regard as quintessentially British, partly because he worked with plants that were familiar to him, and to the British Isles, long before the explosion of trees and shrubs from far-flung locations abroad.



Stowe Gardens - one of
the great "Capers" gardens

One of the great lessons of "Capability" Brown is that of the "long game", which we as gardeners or garden designers know so well, even if we operate on a somewhat smaller scale.  We are used to having to wait for our plantings to grow, and to have the patience and long-term satisfaction rather than the instant gratification that is becoming more normal for our age, but even we do not - and cannot - operate on the same scale as Lancelot Brown.  It took decades for his visions of the landscape to mature; often it was not the landowner, but the landowner's sons or grandsons (and presumably daughters and granddaughters, even if they couldn't inherit the estate - Ed) who were perhaps the first to share the reality of his ideas.  We must count ourselves fortunate that we are able to enjoy the consequences of a life devoted to creation, in a way that the designer knew he could not, as they would not be properly established in his own lifetime.