Percival Stephen Cane (1881–1976) was an English garden designer and writer.

Biography

Cane was born and educated in Essex, studying horticulture and architecture. He designed scores of gardens over a long and distinguished career, and won frequent medals for his gardens at the

Chelsea Flower Show The RHS Chelsea Flower Show, formally known as the ''Great Spring Show'',Phil Clayton, ''The Great Temple Show'' in ''The Garden'' 2008, p.452, The Royal Horticultural Society is a garden show held for five days in May by the Royal Horticultural ...

. As a writer, he published four books on gardening, and owned and published two horticulture magazines. His gardens were firmly in the Arts and Crafts style, and he was a particular admirer of Harold Peto's work.

Selected gardens

Cane began designing gardens around 1919 and within a decade he had become one of the most sought-after designers of his day. His gardens range from the grounds of the Jubilee Palace of Haile Selassie, the Emperor of Ethiopia, in Addis Ababa, to a tiny town garden in Taptonville Road, Sheffield. Other commissions included: * Caythorpe Court in Lincolnshire for Mrs Elma Yerburgh * Ivy House, Hampstead, for Anna Pavlova in 1926 *

Llannerch Hall Llanerch Hall, Trefnant, Clwyd, Wales, is a country house with medieval origins. It was rebuilt twice at the beginning and at the end of the 17th century, was again rebuilt in the 19th century, and further modified in the 20th. The hall is now di ...

St Asaph, North Wales, 1927–29 *

Hascombe Court Hascombe Court is a estate in Hascombe, Surrey, best known for its vast garden designed by Gertrude Jekyll. Hascombe Court is listed Grade II on the National Heritage List for England, and its gardens are also Grade II listed on the Register of ...

Godalming Godalming is a market town and civil parish in southwest Surrey, England, around southwest of central London. It is in the Borough of Waverley, at the confluence of the Rivers Wey and Ock. The civil parish covers and includes the settleme ...

, 1928–29 * Boden's Rise, Ascot, in 1929 * the King's House, Burhill in 1935 for th
Royal Warrant Holders' Association
ref name=":0" /> * the grounds of the British Pavilion at the

1939 New York World's Fair The 1939–40 New York World's Fair was a world's fair held at Flushing Meadows–Corona Park in Queens, New York, United States. It was the second-most expensive American world's fair of all time, exceeded only by St. Louis's Louisiana Purchas ...

* Dartington Hall for Leonard and Dorothy Elmhirst, from 1945 to 1971 * Hungerdown House,

Seagry Seagry is a civil parish in Wiltshire, England, about southeast of Malmesbury and northeast of Chippenham. Its main settlements are the village of Upper Seagry, which was first mentioned in official records under the name Over Seagry (in 1317) ...

, Wiltshire, 1945–46 * Seales Court,

, Wiltshire, 1957 * Falkland Palace, Fife from 1946 * Westfields, Oakley, Bedfordshire, 1953–64 *

Sutton Park, Yorkshire Sutton Park is an 18th-century Georgian English country house situated on the edge of the village of Sutton-on-the-Forest, North Yorkshire. It is approximately 10 miles north of York, in the ancient Forest of Galtres. The house, a Grade I listed ...

in 1962 * Mellerstain House, Scottish borders * Moundsmere Manor, Basingstoke * Sulgrave Manor, Oxfordshire

Awards and designations

Cane's contributions to important gardens in England are noted in nine entries in the Historic England Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of special historic interest in England, which aims to "celebrate designed landscapes of note." They are: the 1927 terrace on the hilltop a
St Ann's Hill
in Chertsey; his embellishments and extensions in the late 1920s to designs by

Gertrude Jekyll Gertrude Jekyll ( ; 29 November 1843 – 8 December 1932) was a British horticulturist, garden designer, craftswoman, photographer, writer and artist. She created over 400 gardens in the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States, and wrote ...

at Hascombe Court in Godalming; the gardens a
Seven Stones House
in Kent; advice on the gardens a
Ditchingham Hall
in Norfolk; 1930s developments to the gardens at Woburn Abbey, Bedfordshire; formal terraced gardens from the 1930s (no longer extant) at Stoneleigh Abbey, Warwickshire; the 1940s Priory gardens at Hedsor House, Buckinghamshire; the tiltyard, hydrangea walk, glade, stone bastion, monumental flight of steps, and other features at Dartington Hall, Devon; and formal terraced gardens installed in 1960 a
Sharpham House
Devon. Two gardens wholly or partly designed by Cane in Scotland are designated "of national importance" and are thus included on the Historic Scotland Inventory of Gardens and Designed Landscapes. His work at Falkland Palace in the late 1940s "gives Falkland Palace gardens outstanding value as a Work of Art." The river garden he designed for Monteviot, Jedburgh, in the 1960s contributes to the garden's designation as "outstanding." In addition, the gardens designed by Cane are mentioned in the Statement of Special Interest for the listed building at Ardencraig, Rothesay. Cane exhibited show gardens at the Royal Horticultural Society's Chelsea Flower Show over a number of years, winning eight gold medals (in 1936, 1937, 1938, 1947, 1948, 1949, 1951 and 1952) and three silver-gilt (1934, 1935 and 1950). In 1963 he was awarded the RHS's Veitch Memorial Medal, an international prize awarded to "persons of any nationality who have made an outstanding contribution to the advancement of the art, science or practice of horticulture."

Selected writings

Cane published four books on horticulture during his career: * ''Modern Gardens British and Foreign'', Special Winter Number of "The Studio", 1926–27, London : The Studio, 1927. * ''Garden design of to-day'', London : Methuen, 1934. * ''The Earth Is My Canvas'', London : Methuen, 1956. * ''The creative art of garden design'', London : Country Life, 1967. He also owned and edited the horticultural magazines ''My Garden, Illustrated'' (1918–20) and ''Garden Design'' (1930–38). A full-length biography, ''Percy Cane, Garden Designer'', was written by Ronald Webber and published in 1975.

Gallery

File:Falkland Palace Garden - geograph.org.uk - 952544.jpg, Falkland Palace Garden File:Falkland Palace - geograph.org.uk - 703512.jpg, Falkland Palace Garden File:Falkland Palace - geograph.org.uk - 703518.jpg, Falkland Palace Garden File:The Glade, Dartington Hall Gardens - geograph.org.uk - 827466.jpg, The Glade, Dartington Hall Gardens File:The Glade, Dartington Hall Gardens - geograph.org.uk - 1401688.jpg, The Glade, Dartington Hall Gardens File:Steps up Heath Bank, Dartington - geograph.org.uk - 827477.jpg, Flight of Steps, Dartington Hall Gardens File:The Tiltyard, Dartington - geograph.org.uk - 497464.jpg, The Tiltyard, Dartington Hall Gardens File:Azalea Dell, Dartington, in autumn - geograph.org.uk - 270267.jpg, Azalea Dell, Dartington Hall Gardens File:George Henry Paulin (1888-1962) - Anna Pavlova (after 1931 -q-) left, garden of Ivy House, Golders Green, London (now the Jewish Cultural Centre) May 2013 (10811092933).png, A Paulin statue in the garden at Ivy House File:1939britishpavilion.jpg, British Pavilion at the 1939 New York World's Fair File:Sutton Park Sutton on the Forest.jpg, Sutton Park, Yorkshire File:Trees on St.Ann's Hill - geograph.org.uk - 1224325.jpg, St Ann's Hill, Chertsey

References