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Agatha Christie's Greenway (Devon, England) - The House

I can think of two places that we visited where I enjoyed the house more than the gardens. The first was Greenway, not for the house itself, which was surprisingly small and cramped, but for the history behind it and the fascinating mementos on display. Agatha Christie and her husband Max Mallowan were enthusiastic collectors. You can see their collections on display throughout the house - European and Oriental ceramics, pottery, African tribal masks, Egyptian artifacts, Tunbridge ware, china, trinkets, and books. The Morning Room has a portrait of Agatha Christie as a child and her doll Rosie, sitting in a chair - The Drawing Room was where the family would gather in the evenings. Christie would entertain guests by reading chapters from manuscripts of her latest books.  Agatha Christie's bedroom. Max always slept on a smaller portable traveling cot (you can see part of it in the foreground). It was his favorite bed and he carried it with him on all of his archaeological travels. N...

The First Peony - 'Shima-Nishiki'



The Tree Peony 'Shima-Nishiki' is the first to bloom. The name means "fire flame" in Japanese, an apt title to describe the red blooms striped with white. Occasionally, there are solid red blooms.

Every year this peony gets better and seemingly overnight, the puny-looking bare branches are suddenly fleshed out with a tremendous profusion of leaves. The bush is dense, forming a 4 ft. mound. Our plant resides at the top of one of the terrace beds in back where it gets some morning sun and dappled sun (mostly shade) for the remainder of the day. 

We have many peonies in the garden and they all came from Adelman Peony Gardens in Salem, Oregon. It is worth a drive just to see their beautiful display garden in May.






Text and photos by Phillip Oliver, Dirt Therapy

Comments

  1. Stunning, with just a touch of white... Wow!
    Chavli

    ReplyDelete
  2. Oh, it is absolute perfection. I love that you placed it by the red branched (maple?) pot.

    ReplyDelete

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