HISTORIC PARKS AND GARDENS IN THE SUSSEX DOWNS AONB

Historic Parks and Gardens are an important part of the historic and cultural landscape of the Sussex Downs Area of Outstanding Beauty (AONB). There is a wide range from medieval deer parks and hunting lodges, 17th century formal gardens with bowling green, grand avenues, 18th century English landscape gardens, Victorian pleasure grounds and plant collections, institutional landscapes and domestic scale gardens. Whilst some have had the involvement of well known designers such as Brown, Repton, Nesfield, Jekyll and Peto, many have been the creation of the owner or gardener, influenced by the styles of the time or owners particular interest.

The English Heritage’s register of Historic Parks and Gardens list 22 sites within the AONB. These are predominately the large houses and estates such as Goodwood House, Arundel Castle, Stansted Park and Glynde Place. However this is only a small part of the story. A map survey of sites within Chichester District Council alone, has identified a further 65 sites of local historic interest.

Many of these lesser known sites have suffered a gradual decline over the years caused by a number of factors or threats, many of which continue to pose a problem. These are:-
- Lack of knowledge – whilst a designed landscape may be easily identified from old maps, there is often very little additional documentary evidence available. Often the historic importance is only known (rather incompletely) by local historians or an interested property owner. Landowners are often quite unaware of the history within their ownership.
- Social change – historic parks and gardens were created as an expression of social status, a demonstration of the power to transform the surrounding landscape to provide a place to enjoy and entertain visitors. As this function changed in response to social trends or changes in family ownership the gardens declined or were superseded by new designs. For example the large country house with its ornamental grounds, walled gardens and parkland, tended by a large number of servants and estate workers, could no longer be supported following the loss of staff after the world wars. The changing need of a smaller household and faced by the high costs of maintenance of a bigger property led to the break up of many estates and sometimes the demolition of the house.
- Loss of principal residence – once the main house was demolished the purpose for the landscape setting was lost.
- Multiple ownerships – since the second world war there has been an increasing trend towards the breaking up of larger estates into more valuable smaller lots. Whilst the introduction of tax relief for properties of national heritage quality has helped to keep intact some of the more important sites there has been no support for the locally important sites. The parkland is frequently sold off for agricultural use, the main house and outbuildings split up and sold off separately for residential use, the pleasure grounds subdivided to create new gardens. The house holders no longer have an influence on the surrounding landscape and as they develop their own properties and secure their privacy eg through erecting fences, hedges, sheds and garages, the integrity of the designed landscape is lost.
- Agricultural change – agricultural policy and subsidies has affected the land use of historic landscapes. The major influence has been the ploughing of parkland for arable production. Whilst some parkland trees have survived within an arable rotation they are very vulnerable to loss from close ploughing, spray drift and removal of trees to allow access for large machinery.
- Storm damage – the storms of 1987 and 1990 caused considerable losses of mature parkland trees within historic landscapes in Sussex. Whilst there was some replanting stimulated by the Task Force Trees Scheme it had little real impact across the landscape. Parkland is becoming a rare landscape feature.
- Development – the threat from major developments such as road improvements, housing and mineral extraction is in practice quite limited in the AONB because of the existing planning controls. However the impact of building conversions, the inappropriate location of new farm buildings needed to meet EC regulations and small scale works that do not require planning permission are having a cumulative effect on the integrity of historic parks and gardens.
We need to know more about all the historic parks and gardens within the Sussex Downs, not just the listed sites. Further research is needed on the historical background to these sites, the people involved, identifying the features of the designed landscape and establishing what remains and their current condition.
The Sussex Gardens Trust, Research and Recording Group, are helping with this task. However they always need more people to help with research. If you want to find out more about the work of the Trust or you are interested in researching your local parks and gardens, try the Sussex Gardens Trust website http://sussexgardenstrust.org.uk/