John Claudius Loudon - father of the English garden - Development of his gardenesque style

Development of his 'gardenesque style’

In 1819, he embarked on another European tour: this time to France and Italy. These trips to Europe influenced his thinking on design as he came to admire the great formal gardens of the Continent, particularly in Italy. He was also now changing his philosophical views and aligning them with Quatremère de Quincy, who championed a return to classical aesthetics and Platonic ideals.

Quatremère did not believe that English landscape gardening could be considered one of the fine arts. Loudon’s response was his ‘gardenesque’ style, which he developed over the next 20 years. According to Turner, ‘Loudon’s conversion to the Italian style is one of the great turning points in the history of English garden design. He was the first theoretician to realise that the century-long quest to imitate ever-wilder versions of nature had led to a dead end’.[10]

The following year Loudon began his first large-scale literary work, the Encyclopaedia of Gardening, which he completed in 1822. The encyclopaedia was to go through nine editions, its popularity due to its comprehensive nature, as it encompassed the historical, technical, aesthetic and horticultural aspects of gardening.

Russell Square, London. Copyright Sarah JacksonIn this work, Loudon returned to the theme of creating of new public spaces, particularly in large cities. He reflected that, unlike its continental neighbours, Britain had few places for its citizens to promenade by horse or on foot. In 1829 he wrote an article called Breathing Places for the Metropolis in which ‘the idea of a circular promenade was developed into an extremely far-sighted greenbelt proposal’.[11] He designed St Peter’s Square in Hammersmith, London in about 1825.

Loudon’s campaign for public parks, particularly in London, was taken up by politicians and led to the creation of Victoria Park in Bow. He also designed a park at Gravesend in 1835, but this was sold for building development in 1875. Its planting scheme appeared ‘to be based on Loudon’s 1812 proposal for a circular botanical garden. The 1812 plan has a spiral path which enabled plants to be viewed in their correct sequence and a cross axis which returned the visitor to the starting point’.[12]