I’ll destroy my garden, says Sir Roy after National Trust snub

THE largest private formal garden to be created in England since 1945 is to be “destroyed” after an offer to bequeath it to the National Trust was snubbed, The Daily Telegraph reports.

Sir Roy Strong, former director of the Victoria and Albert Museum and National Portrait Gallery, had wanted to leave Laskett Gardens to the trust in his will. He also offered the trust an endowment worth “several millions” to ensure the financial viability of the gardens, which he spent more than 30 years creating with his late wife.

But the trust has rejected the offers because, it says, the garden fails to “reach the high rung of historic and national importance”. Sir Roy is so devastated that his offer has been turned down he has threatened to “destroy” the four-acre garden at his home in Herefordshire.

‘I’m so upset now that I have decided to change my will, stating that the garden will stay open to the public for one year after my death, and then be destroyed.’ Clarifying what he meant by “destroyed”, Sir Roy said: ‘Not bulldozed as such, but I will ensure that all the personal aspects which really make the garden so extraordinary are taken away. The house will now be sold after my death. There will be a garden attached with it, but not as it is now.’

‘It’s my garden, and I can do what I want with it,’ he told the BBC.

The garden is currently to the public with an admission fee of £12 per person. 

Visit http://thelaskettgardens.co.uk

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Picture Credit: Laskett Gardens courtesy thelaskettgardens.co.uk