A few miles east of Droitwich, just off the Alcester Road, stands Hanbury Hall, a National Trust property, with a large garden, some fine tapestries decorating the walls of the staircase and interesting pictures.
The original Baroque interior was much altered when Emma Vernon and her husband came to live there in 1770. Because they wished to be in the forefront of fashion, both the house and garden went through many changes over the next few years. The original garden was probably laid out by George London during the early 1700's. He and his partner ran the Brompton Nursery and were responsible for introducing the well loved Brompton Stocks. Emma and her husband changed all that. Thanks to garden archaeology and the use of old drawings and designs, the garden is now in the process of being restored to its initial splendour. There is a sunken garden - parterre - where neat geometric beds present a formal pattern of herbs and flowers amid box edging. A few years ago this was just a bare patch of earth, now, when summer comes it resembles a jewelled carpet.
There is a wildness, in which Jane Austen would have felt at home, and a walk between large cedar trees leads away from the house and gives wide views over the park land. A picture of what England might have looked like a century ago with cattle grazing in buttercup filled fields.
Through a kissing gate at the end of the cedar walk is the ice house, a strange dark place. In the days before refrigerators and when the winters were colder, ice would be cut from the ponds and stored in a semi underground chamber so that iced puddings and sorbets could be served during the hot summer days. This particular ice house was built during the mid 1700's and could hold 24 tons of ice. Dragging ice from the ponds on a freezing day must have been hard work and cutting it in summer, not a lot easier.
Can you create more words or pictures for this or another page? You don't have to be an expert. Borrow a book from the library to get the basics of your subject , but write in your own words and add a little something to make it special. 100-300 words would be enough for your first piece: this short note is more than 100. You can always add more later! Any photo you took or has been in your family for years is a possibility. Is there something distinctively local about it - not necessarily the place, but perhaps the people, what they are wearing or doing? Send it by email to whe@freeuk.com, or by post to Worcester Writers' Circle c/o Worcester Library, Foregate Street, Worcester WR1 1DT.