The Garden History Society (GHS) has created the first ever inventory of Conservation Management Plans (CMPs), a resource which will prove vitally important to anyone conserving or researching historic designed landscapes and gardens.
The GHS writes:
CMPs are substantial commissioned research documents relating to many of Britain’s most important and best-loved parks and gardens, from private residences to visitor attractions.
More than 1,000 CMPs have been tracked down describing landscapes up and down the country, and rather than languishing on dusty shelves they will now provide an invaluable resource for those working on conserving the gardens for the future. A CMP is very often the single best source of information, plans and analysis relating to a landscape or garden – but too often they have been unused by researchers who may be unaware of their existence.
Dominic Cole, Chairman of The Garden History Society says: ‘Many such plans have been prepared over the years for public and private properties and it is very exciting that English Heritage have supported the GHS in compiling as full a list as possible of what CMPs have been produced and where they may now be found. This will be an invaluable source of information for garden owners, managers and researchers.’
In recent years it has become clear that the value of Conservation Management Plans (CMPs) extends beyond their function as management strategies – they also form an exciting mass of research on the UK’s designed landscape heritage, typically including considerable work on a site’s history, development and surviving state.
Dr Marion Harney, Chair of Joint Conservation Committee of The Garden History Society and the Association of Gardens Trusts (JCC) explains that: ‘In order to understand the heritage asset, CMPs describe how it has changed over time, from the earliest period to the present day using documentary research, archival information, historical maps and plans, archaeological information, oral history and field observations. These include published or unpublished sources, guidebooks or reports and the location of important sources of information, making them an invaluable resource to students, researchers and all those interested in understanding why our heritage is important and to whom it matters.’
To harness the potential of this information, in 2012 The Garden History Society launched a project to compile a reference list of CMPs and related research for historic designed landscapes. This was made possible with sponsorship and support from English Heritage.
Over the following year, the GHS called for details of CMPs from historians, landscape architecture practices, County Gardens Trusts, national heritage organisations, local authorities and individual properties. Colleagues from across the heritage sector immediately recognized the value of such a list, such as landscape architect Simon Bonvoison of Nicholas Pearson Partnership: ‘We are delighted to support this project by The Garden History Society, not just as an inventory for our own plans, but also as a way to involve the public, and to encourage the adoption of informed conservation by planning authorities, site owners and other partners.’
The project met with a tremendous response, and the information received has now been collated into a list of some 1000 entries. Working in partnership with Parks & Gardens UK, the freely accessible online resource of historic parks and gardens, the list has now been published.
The published list is not intended to be a definitive catalogue of all CMPs relating to historic designed landscapes but it is hoped entries will be added in future, growing into a comprehensive reference.
The Hestercombe Gardens Trust (Somerset) plans to set up a Centre of Landscape Studies with a CMP archive and has advised on the GHS CMP project. For the moment though, the list simply offers an indication that the CMP exists – many are however available at publicly accessible archives or online.
The Garden History Society continues to welcome submissions, or additional details to existing entries, to cmp@gardenhistorysociety.org
The Garden History Society list of CMPs is now available at www.parksandgardens.org
