Otley Hall and garden

Following a Trail: Otley Hall

Posted on by Ann Mackay

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Last year my husband and I joined other visitors on ‘The Great Garden Trail’. This is a summer-long event for which volunteers open their gardens to raise money for the St Elizabeth Hospice in Ipswich, Suffolk. Gardens of all sorts take part in the scheme, big and small, filled with exciting plants, or more modestly planted. Some of the gardens are the setting for interesting historic houses and occasionally there may be a village with many of its gardens open to explore.

Otley Hall turned out to be in the ‘modestly planted’ category. I would have been disappointed if I’d gone there just to see the gardens, but I also love Suffolk’s quaint medieval houses, so the visit was worthwhile.

Otley Hall
I couldn’t help but stop and admire the massive chimney, which looks as if it was built to impress anyone approaching the door.

Built in the early sixteenth century, Otley Hall is said to be the oldest house in Suffolk to have remained ‘largely intact’, with some parts of the building added later in the same century. Timber-framed buildings from medieval times are a feature of Suffolk’s countryside and many of its towns and villages. They make you feel as if you could step back in history by just walking inside them. (But we didn’t go inside this one – it was only the garden that was open on our visit.)

In the garden itself, my attention was captured by the beautiful irises which were in full flower, especially the white iris above, with the little hints of colour, and the blue one below. (Our visit was at the end of May, a little too early for the many roses there to be in bloom.)

The main flower borders edged a croquet lawn, one of several lawns throughout the gardens. Other grassy areas featured a labyrinth, ‘The Mount’ – an artificial mound which allows views of the surrounding countryside, and an H-shaped canal. (The house still has a moat on one side too.)

Otley’s ten acres have a mix of both formal gardens and informal, more natural grounds. For example, near the house there is a small ‘knot garden’ with box hedging and herbs planted up in a classic Tudor-style design. Elsewhere there are woodlands and hedgerows, maintained to encourage wildlife and areas planted up with wildflowers.

Formal and informal, clockwise from top left: wisteria on an arch beside the house, abelia growing beside a lawn, irises along the wilder edges of the canal, a vetch in a wildflower area.

The combination of traditional and wilder areas gives an easy-going feel to a stroll around the gardens of Otley Hall. It’s not the best garden for a plantaholic to visit, but it does offer a pleasant afternoon with the opportunity to see a fine example of a medieval timber-framed house. (It has an excellent cafe too…coffee and cake is an important part of our garden visits!)

Otley Hall
There’s a walk beside the moat which allows a glimpse of the back of the house.

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Published by Ann Mackay

Photographer, mixed-media art adventurer and completely daft about plants.......

16 thoughts on “Following a Trail: Otley Hall”

  4. There are neighborhoods — or individual homes — here and there that are very much like Otley Hall: except for the chimneys. I’ve always thought of them as faux Tudor; whether that’s the time period I don’t know, but the half-timbered look was quite popular here in the mid-1900s.

    I especially enjoyed seeing the wisteria and the vetch. I like that there are different sorts of areas planted around the house — not to mention the cake and coffee!

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Faux-Tudor is a good description for modern houses in that half-timbered style and they were popular in some areas here too. I liked the mix of wild and formal, which means they see quite a lot of wildlife there. (It gives a relaxed and comfortable feel to the grounds too.)

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