One of my readers had instructed me to go to Kew Gardens to experience it without the constant roaring scream of jets descending into nearby Heathrow, so how could I not?
It was an utterly different experience.
I have never been here when it's been so completely restful, so exquisitely peaceful.
In fact, the only plane to be seen anywhere was this -- a London Plane (Platanus × hispanica, in fact):
The gardens are so huge that, even on a gloriously sunny day, it's possible to escape from everyone:
Although if you want the more amusement arcade-y bits, you have to suffer the Hell that is other people:
(The treetop walkway is well worth it though. Really, even for a misanthrope like me. Architecture by Marks Barfield.)
Less showy pleasures are to be had, too -- like the new-ish Sackler Crossing, a delightful John Pawson/Buro Happold design which makes great play of light and shadow.
Alas, the bridge was really swarming so it's not possible to show you the sinuous "S" curve of the structure in one of my own photos -- you have to have someone else's:
Back to my stuff, now...
Even the more authoritarian parts of Kew are done with elegance:
And the plane-free skies are giving us a glorious interlude -- I urge you to enjoy Kew while it lasts.
Really: it's like another world there now.
1 comment:
Kew is a great place.
Fred in Florida
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