A real pleasure

THE first thing that seizes the attention of the visitor to the 15 acres of gardens at Brodsworth Hall near Doncaster is the population of individual topiary pieces that line up along the left-hand side of the drive. Domes, pillars and mounds of a mixed selection of evergreens are clipped into an entertaining crowd of varied heights and girths against the calm dark backdrop of the seemingly endless yew boundary hedge. It is a scene you might expect to find in an Italian garden.

This impression is confirmed as one approaches the main south front of the house, an imposing white ashlar limestone building in the Italianate style of the mid 1860s. House and grounds are a perfect complement of Italianate green architecture and are linked by formal terraces with three staircases decorated by marble urns and recumbent—probably Italian—greyhounds acquired by