Skinny Dipping In The Gibberd Garden

It was Snowdrop Sunday at the Grade II listed garden created by Sir Frederick Gibberd and his second wife on the outskirts of Harlow. He was the designer of the new town and bought the secluded pocket of land in 1957.

I am not a visitor to gardens usually, I'm not keen on the artifice but I thought I'd take a look and had planned to shoot snowdrops. I didn't realise until I read it this week that they are a naturalized genus. The garden is arranged, in common with many famous ones, in a series of 'rooms'. Each area has sculptures, ninety in all, many of which did not appeal to me. It has been said that it is the garden of an intellectual designed to amuse. Felt a bit Emperor's New Clothes to me. Too much poor quality, pudding-mix concrete abounding.

I spent some time photographing Gerda Rubinstein's Mother and Child, thinking I might use it for the Tog Squad February theme of 'Love.' The statue in my pic is also by this artist. It is of her daughter Lucinda after skinny dipping in the Pincey Brook at the bottom of the garden sculpted from memory.