Chatsworth Flowers (and an ice cream)

When I got back from my most recent visit to Chatsworth gardens, I realised I hadn't taken photos of any of the 'hard' landscaping or water features - the huge fountain, the Cascade, the various ponds.

I just had masses of photos of flowers, and an ice cream :)

So here are the flowers. 

A lot of similar flowers appear throughout the garden, repeated from one area to another to give a sense of wholeness to such a large subdivided space (in total it's 105 acres). So I've arranged them more by type then by the part of the garden.

There are so many different shades and sizes of iris, all the blues and purples, plus yellow 'flags' here in the kitchen garden and alongside streams and ponds. The almost black is the most striking though best seen in contrast to others - I'm not sure I'd fill a garden with it

The peonies were so gorgeous and flamboyant, covering every shade from white to deepest pink.

A row of several different shades grows along the north-facing wall of the Maze, and more are to be found in the cutting garden.

My favourite area of the garden is Arcadia, the newly planted section that runs across the hillside. 

It's all carefully planted with the flowers here all in shades of white, pink, purple and even green, but feels like a wild meadow. 

It's exuberant yet at the same time calming - an excellent place to just sit for a while.

Further on there are wilder bits of garden - buttercups allowed to flower freely, and ox-eye daisies lining the Grotto pond, showing how wonderful even native wild flowers can be.