Paradise REVISED

To enter the gardens of Wollerton Old Hall is to receive the definitive tutorial in the art, style and essence of the English garden and yet Wollerton has emerged without overt ceremony or publicity and is unmolested by designer ego. Consequently, this garden reveals a charming humility, a personable, relatable and generous character that quietly expresses a performance of sublime brilliance. The route to becoming a jewel among the nation’s finest gardens was, however, far from well defined.

Just a short distance from Market Drayton in north Shropshire, Wollerton Old Hall is a private garden and home to Lesley and John Jenkins. They bought the property in 1983, but this was by no means Lesley’s first encounter with the 16th-century hall.

“My father was a flying instructor in the Royal Air Force,