France for Nature Lovers - Gardens of Brittany

If there is a place perfect for planting fabulous gardens, it has to be northern Brittany, a land endowed with subtle light and a climate mild enough for palm trees. It is the Gulf Stream that makes Brittany so special; the warm sea current helping to create a temperate microclimate where exotic plants thrive. Did you know, for example, that La Bretagne was home to the first camellias ever grown in Europe?

The parks and gardens of Brittany are filled with unusual sights, whether botanic or historic, which enthral the eye of amateur and expert gardeners alike. From the colourful borders of English-style gardens bursting with poetic licence, to formal medieval displays and tropical collections, there is a wealth of different gardens to discover, all set against the backdrop of the stunning, rugged Breton coast.

In each of these green spaces, you will find a private world, where you can experience a little peace, away from the stresses and strains of everyday life. One such secret garden is Kerdalo (from ker, house and dalo, orchard), tucked into the lee of a hillside that cascades down to the Jaudy estuary, a stone’s throw from Tréguier, the historic capital of Trégor province in the Côtes d’Armor. This is a hidden world, fashioned by nature and man, with more than 9,000 plants set in 25 acres of lovely landscaped grounds—and it has a fascinating history.

In 1965, already aged 65, painter-gardener Prince Peter Wolkonsky, who graduated from the Paris École des Beaux-Arts in 1925, abandoned the family property and its unforgiving soil at Saint-Cloud in la région parisienne, and settled at Trédarzec, a vast estate lost in an enclosed valley facing the resort of Tréguier.

A Russian aristocrat whose family had moved to France in 1914 when he was a boy, Wolkonsky remodelled the derelict stone farmhouse known as Le Verger into a manoir christened Kerdalo, adding a wing and a tower to form a courtyard that would survey the surrounding countryside.

Then he began to move the earth, reshaping the ground by bulldozer, carving herbaceous beds into the steeply sloping land above the house. He also levelled the hillside below for terraces, and re-routed the all-important spring from the adjacent woodland, in order to create a steady flow of water feeding a canal dug next to the house that burbles down to the Jaudy estuary. There is a bounty of rare trees and shrubs at Kerdalo because, year after year, the prince ordered the latest and best cultivars from English nurseries, most of which bear the coveted ‘distinction of merit’ awarded by the Royal Horticultural Society.

VISION

Organised in subtle colour palettes, the hillside slides into the ravine in groupings of maples, golden cypresses and dogwoods. Just imagine a glossy army of red camellias lining an avenue that borders a grove of fifty varieties of magnolia: it is a kaleidoscopic vision... Following Wolkonsky’s death in 1997, his daughter Isabelle and her husband, landscape architect Timothy Vaughan, now tend the gardens. Isabelle says: “Kerdalo is a fragile world, at the mercy of time, of climate change and pollution, but it has survived lots of disasters: the drought of 1976, the bitter winters of 1984 and 1985, the two storms of 1987 which brought down 347 trees, the heavy floods of 2000 and the heat wave of 2003.”

A green space which has not fared so well in recent storms is the garden of the château de la Roche-Jagu. The pink granite renaissance castle sits high on a cliff above the mud flats of the Trieux River just north of Pontrieux, and is the compelling centrepiece of a 70-acre public park, which was badly damaged in hurricanes in 1987. Since then, the castle and gardens, which were donated to the Côtes-d’Armor département in 1958 by Monsieur Le Vicomte d’Alès, have experienced something of a rebirth. Landscape architect, Bertrand Paulet, an authority on the Middle Ages, was given the job of rebuilding the parks and the result is a virtuoso performance successfully blending a medieval garden, a palm grove and a camellia wood with works of modern art. For example, sculptor Irène Le Goaster recently breathed new life into the domaine’s beech trees felled in 2004, working on the wood ‘in situ’.

A great emphasis has also been placed on demonstration beds incorporated within the steep, ancient ramparts, in order to remind everyone of the region’s heritage when the trade of le lin (the blue-flowered flax) was part of local life. On a more contemporary note there are round windows cut out of hornbeam hedges and wrap-around wicker benches encircling craggy apple trees. Idyllic picnic places overlook the estuary and the views are breathtaking, especially when the castle glows in the sun.

In 2004, discovery workshops sprouted in the greenery of La Roche Jagu, encouraging nature lovers to walk with horticulturists, secateurs and basket in hand, each Saturday and on selected Wednesdays from April to August.

At La Roche Jagu inventiveness and sophistication cohabit alongside nature—it is a paradise regained.

EXOTICISM

Down the coast from these two botanical gems is a small garden brimming over with exoticism worthy of Ali Baba’s cave of treasures.

Daniel Person and Louis Kerdiles created Le Jardin Exotique de Roscoff in 1987 under the auspices of the Groupement Roscovite des Amateurs de Plantes Exotiques which manages the garden. It sells plants and improves its collection yearly from this revenue.

The garden covers only 1.6 hectares but it seems much larger, thanks to winding paths and colourful blocks of planting.

When you progress through the garden, different vantage points are on offer but the most prized is the 18-metre-high gigantic mass of granite rock—le Roch’ Hievec— which offers a panoramic view of La Baie de Morlaix and the whole garden filled with rare or tropical plants. Le Roch’ Hievec used to be topped by a wooden construction painted in red nicknamed by the Roscoff inhabitants la cabane de l’espion, (the spy’s hut) and farmers would unload their decayed rotten produce at its foot.

Person’s love affair with Le Jardin sees him on a perpetual quest for rare seeds from around the world with which to embellish it, and he maintains contact with the most prestigious foreign concerns, such as Kirstenbosch Gardens in South Africa.

At the moment, more than 3,000 species of plants from the Southern hemisphere, particularly Australia, Chile and South Africa (some of them rarely seen in cultivated form) are established in Roscoff—an incredible feat, even if there is a microclimate!

Highlights include the South African Protea Cynaroide (King Sugarbush), South Africa’s national flower exhibiting a superb 30 centimetre flowerhead, and the Geranium Maderense, a very supple plant despite its big size, which supports itself and its collection de fleurs rose Magenta with its old stalks that act as numerous ‘walking sticks’. Who needs to trot to the end of the world when you have incredible vistas of the Canary Islands’ echiums dangling their pinky violet heads like giant triffids?

From the truly exotic to the traditionally formal, a visit to Montmarin on a bank of the River Rance is a step back in time. The perfectly manicured French formal garden is practically unchanged since the day it was designed. The park, laid out in 1885 in the English style, with its historic trees, wide lawns, thickets, rock garden and flowering borders, adds new varieties on a yearly basis. But this classic vista has a surprising history, traces of which can still be found at the bottom end of the park, lined with echiums, which bears testimony to its one-time links with ship-building.

PANORAMIC

Montmarin was built in 1760 by wealthy Aaron Magon, already proprietor of the château du Bosq situated on the opposite bank of the river. It is the only Malouinière (the typical 18th-century summer residence of rich ship-owners and merchants from Saint-Malo) to be located on the left bank of the Rance, enjoying a magnificent panoramic view across the estuary.

But Aaron had decided that Montmarin was to be constructed as an elegant residence, rather than in the traditional functional and austere Malouinière fashion.

An imposing classic gateway that opened on to the Court of Honour was designed, adorned with a splendid 18th-century fountain crafted in white Carrare marble. There, two palm trees stand, indicative of the Gulf Stream’s favourable influence in these parts. In striking contrast with the classicism of the entrance side of the house, the main façade giving on the River Rance was erected in a fanciful Louis XV elegance, with its pavilions roofed in the shape of an upturned keel.

The writers of the period, Madame de Genlis and famed author Chateaubriand had nothing but praise for the 15-acre park sloping gently down to the Rance in a series of terraces and even included descriptions of it in their work. But Magon was bankrupted by Montmarin and, five years after his death, his widow sold the property to Benjamin Dubois, an ambitious ship-owner. From that moment, shipbuilding started at Montmarin and seven dry docks were established to work on heavily armed warships, equipped with 86 canons. The French Revolution suddenly ended Benjamin’s business and Montmarin was sold to a Revolutionary consortium, only to be returned to its rightful owner in 1798. After 1811, business dwindled again, transforming Montmarin into a milling concern for cereals until 1917.

Another garden which has survived the ravages of war is the Parc Floral de Haute-Bretagne. Records show that in 1796 the château and its park were the headquarters for the Royalist insurgency led by Le Comte de Puisaye against the Republican Army. After Monsieur Le Comte’s defeat near Quiberon, the devastated domaine had to wait until1826 to fall back into the hands of an aristocratic family named Frontin des Buffards. The 50-acre country park design was completed by them four years later among the confines of wooded hills, but after World War II, it was abandoned again.

In September 1994, agricultural expert Alain Jouno fell in love with the site and began the mammoth task of rehabilitating this green valley which sleeps at the meeting point between Brittany and Normandy. The journey through this garden begins with a walk along l’allée des perles blanches (white pearls alley). From this point you travel through 15 gardens where the passionate proprietor-gardener has composed a symphony of landscaped spaces, linked by pathways. There is a garden for children too, and they will enjoy la Cité de Cnossos where an impressive granite Minotaur awaits, after they have found their way through three mazes. In la Source Bleue , strange insectivorous plants inhabit a peat bog. The Venus fly-trap, the pitcher plant and the surprisingly beautiful flowers of the cobra lily shaped like a snake’s head are intriguing. Monsieur Jouno has also incorporated une philosophie du jardin that links travelling the five continents with history and the literary world. La Cité Antique for example re-creates an archaeological site with vegetables, medicinal plants and rows of junipers reminiscent of columns lining the streets of an ancient city.

The Starry Nights and Sunset gardens conclude this communion with nature and the beautiful words of author Antoine de Saint-Exupéry are inscribed by a bench: “If you love a flower that lives on a star, it is sweet at night to look at the sky. All stars are abloom with flowers.”

How to get there

By air

Ryanair operates a daily service from London Stansted Airport to Dinard and a service from Nottingham East Midlands Airport to Dinard.

Flybe flies to Brest and Rennes.

By ferry

Brittany Ferries operates from Plymouth to Roscoff and from Portsmouth to Saint-Malo. Condor Ferries operates from Weymouth and Poole to Saint-Malo.

MORE INFORMATION

An information pack on Brittany is available at:

Maison de la France
178 Piccadilly
London
W1J 9AL
www.franceguide.com

Tel: France Information Line

09068 244 123 (Lines open Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm, calls cost 60p per minute).

Drop in to the French Travel Centre, Ground Floor, 178 Piccadilly, between 10am and 6pm Mondays to Fridays and 10am and 5pm on Saturdays.

Bretagne Nouvelle Vague
Comité Régional du Tourisme
1, rue Raoul Ponchon
35069 Rennes Cedex (Ille-et-Villaine)
Tel: (Fr) 2 99 28 44 46
www.brittanytourism.com
www.tourismebretagne.com
www.brittany-best-breaks.com

PARKS AND GARDENS

LES JARDINS DE KERDALO
22220 Trédarzec
Côtes-d’Armor
Tel: (Fr) 2 96 92 35 94
Open April to September.
Entrance: Adults 4 to 8€, free for under 12s.

DOMAINE DE LA ROCHE-JAGU
22160 Ploëzal
Côtes-d’Armor
Tel: (Fr) 2 96 95 62 35
www.cotesdarmor.fr
Open to the public all year round.
Access to the grounds is free and unrestricted.
The château is open from March to November.
Garden Festival every year on the second Sunday of April.
Entrance: Adults 2€ and children 1€.

JARDIN EXOTIQUE DE ROSCOFF
BP. 54
29682 Roscoff Cédex
Finistère
Tel: (Fr) 2 98 61 29 19
www.jardinexotiqueroscoff.com
Open daily from March to November.
Entrance: Adults 5€, free for under 12s.

LES JARDINS DU MONTMARIN
35730 Pleurtuit
Ille-et-Villaine
Tel: (Fr) 2 99 88 58 79
www.domaine-du-montmarin.com
Park open from April to October.
Entrance: Adults 5.60€,
children aged 7–14: 3.60€;
14–18 years old 4.60€
Plants can be purchased from the nursery.
Journée des Plantes Rares runs during the first weekend of May. Journée des Agapanthes is on the last week of July and first fortnight of August.

PARC FLORAL DE HAUTE-BRETAGNE
35133 Le Châtellier
Ille-et-Villaine
Tel: (Fr) 2 99 95 48 32
www.parcfloralbretagne.com
Open: March to November. Entrance: Adults 8.9€, young people (4-18) from 5.3 to 7.3€. You can visit the park with one of the gardeners for 60€, or with the proprietor for 90€.