Destination Helensburgh looks at history of Glenarn gardens

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In Helensburgh and Lomond we are lucky to have a number of special gardens that open to the public on a regular basis, or occasionally as part of the Scotland’s Garden Scheme.

One of the most special gardens is the glorious Glenarn in Rhu, which opens this week on the spring equinox, March 21, and will remain open for visitors to enjoy all the way through until the autumn equinox on September 21.

Glenarn extends over 12 acres and is recognised as one of the nation’s most important gardens, recognised by its listing in Historic Environment Scotland’s Inventory of Designed Landscapes and Gardens.

Glenarn is a woodland garden and is most famous for its spectacular rhododendrons, both species and hybrids, its beautiful magnolias and overall outstanding horticultural collections.

There is also a burn and pond, and several champion Scottish and UK ‘Champion Trees’.

And while the rhododendrons and magnolias, and drifts of species narcissi, steal the show in spring, there is always something special and unusual to be seen at Glenarn all year round.

One of the most remarkable things about Glenarn is that its original Accession Books survive. These record where the plants came from – their provenance, rather like a fine antique – and the collections are meticulously recorded and labelled.

It is exceptional to have such detailed records of a garden that not only chart the evolution of Glenarn but also reflect and contribute to our understanding of horticulture in Scotland throughout the later 19th and 20th centuries.

The house at Glenarn was built in 1847 to a design by William Spence, and using stone quarried from immediately to the east of the house.

The quarry was developed into a rock garden in 1939 and replanted and redesigned in the1990s.

In the mid-19th century Rhu, Helensburgh, Cove and Kilcreggan, freshly placed within easy reach of Glasgow thanks to their frequent paddle steamer services, were developed with magnificent villas in large garden plots, often as summer residences for wealthy Glasgow merchants.

The original owner of Glenarn, Glasgow lawyer Andrew MacGeorge, built the house and the whole plot was enclosed and laid out with paths meandering around the grounds planted with native and a few exotic trees.

One of the earliest exotics at Glenarn is the stunning red flowered Rhododendron falconeri beside the house, said to have been grown from seed collected by Joseph Hooker on his 1849-50 plant hunting expedition to Sikkim.

Josephs’s father William, a highly eminent botanist, chair of botany at Glasgow University and later director of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew (a position in which Joseph succeeded him) was a friend of Mr MacGeorge, and the Hooker family also holidayed in Helensburgh in the summer.

It was not until the 1920s, when the Gibson family purchased Glenarn, that the great horticultural development really commenced. And it is a tale of triumph out of adversity.

When the Gibson family bought Glenarn they described the gardens as "overgrown jungle, rank with Rhododendron ponticum [the purple invasive rhododendron we see escaped as an invasive species all over the west coast], laurels and self-seeded sycamore and ash".

They had their work cut out for them, and whilst the brothers were accountants by trade, they soon became accomplished horticulturalists, and set out to develop the remarkable garden we enjoy today.

In February 1928, a great storm is said to have wreaked havoc on Glenarn, with more than 60 trees blown over in the gale. From this destruction the spectacular rhododendron collection we enjoy today was born.

The young owner of Glenarn, Archie Gibson, and his younger brother Sandy had become interested in rhododendrons, which had become very fashionable with Scottish lairds and landowners, and they were soon caught up in the excitement of plant hunting expeditions to China and the Himalaya.

During the 1920s and 1930s the Gibson brothers established a large and varied rhododendron collection, with plants collected and exchanged with other collectors such as the Balfours at Dawyck, who subscribed to George Forrest’s plant hunting expeditions to China, Lord Stair at Lochinch, and their mentor John Holms of Formakin.

A great many plants came to Glenarn from the plant hunting expeditions of botanist and British spy Frank Kingdon-Ward to North Western China, Tibet, Myanmar and Assam.

Plants also came from the expeditions to the Himalaya by Frank Ludlow and George Sherriff. It must have been very exciting to welcome the plant hunters home with their tales of derring-do and exotic new and previously unknown plants.

The Gibson family welcomed many visitors to the garden, and in 1936 it became one of the very first private gardens in Scotland to offer continuous public access, a tradition maintained by its current owners, Mike and Sue Thornley.

After the Second World War, the Gibson family focussed on new and rare plants, working in collaboration with other plant collectors and ensuring Glenarn developed an outstanding horticultural collection.

They also developed the magnolia and primula collections and planted daffodils by the thousands. By the 1950s Glenarn was internationally renowned as a horticultural masterpiece.

On the death of Sandy Gibson in 1982, the garden had once again become overgrown, so much so that an article in the American Rhododendron Society Journal concluded that Glenarn was “probably doomed".

Fortunately not! In 1983 the current owners Michael and Sue Thornley bought Glenarn and set about recording, restoring, conserving and propagating the existing collections and expanding and developing the horticultural treasure.

At the last major tree survey of Glenarn in 2012, nine Scottish champions and six UK champion trees were recorded (champion trees are the largest and tallest examples of their kind in the UK).

One of the UK champion trees is a Magnolia rostrata at the bottom of the front lawn, which is now considered to be a threatened species in the wild.

The total accession number of rhododendron species and hybrids now stands at 702, and Glenarn is also home to specimen trees on behalf of the Royal Botanic Garden of Edinburgh's International Conifer Conservation Programme.

Glenarn’s contribution to conservation, biodiversity and horticultural importance is recognised internationally as outstanding.

It is a joy, gardener or not, to explore this self-contained magical landscape. How lucky we are to have this jewel on our doorstep and how grateful we are to Mike and Sue Thornley for not only rescuing Glenarn from a status of "probably doomed" to the beautiful and stunning garden it is today, but also for their generosity in sharing it with all of us.

Glenarn is open from dawn until dusk every day from March 21 to September 21, and visitors are invited to make an honesty box donation in aid of the Scotland's Garden Scheme and its charities.