Occasionally you hit on the perfect tour guide and at Moseley it was Malcolm. Now I'm sure the others would have been just as interesting but Malcolm kept me enthralled in the house with stories of the escape of King Charles the Second (to be) after the Battle of Worcester in 1651and how many items of domestic use came into common parlance such as the Board being the reversible table in the hall where meals were eaten and deals were done and the Chairman being the head of the family who had the only chair, the others consigned to wooden settles or benches. The original house has had a more recent brick shell put around it which belies the interest within, but wait, its the topiary you've come to see!

The Parterre at Moseley, based on a pattern used by the Reverend Walter Stonehouse in Yorkshire in the 1640's was planted by the National Trust and has now reached maturity and is well worth seeing. It consists of box hedging with box ball standards in strategic places and is best seen, as intended, from an upper window, although you will find this difficult on a busy day.

The front door leads to a road along which King Charles saw his dejected troops retreat along the road which was then a major highway north. In this small section domestic in scale are some box specimens which give it a charming character.

 

All photographs by Anthony Blagg.

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