“Ancient peace” - Iford Manor Gardens

A very old memory woke up in my mind a few days ago: I was with my parents on a day trip to Mount Etna when, at the end of a steep slope, my dad stopped the car we were traveling in and let us - me, my mum, and my brother - get out to enjoy the fresh air and stretch our legs. The exact moment I stepped out, I encountered the silence, a silence I had never heard before. I could listen to my breath, my heartbeat, my thoughts echoing in a void that was far from being scary or unwelcoming. I felt light and alive. Although the silence wasn’t quite the same when I visited Iford Manor in May, leaving London for the Wiltshire countryside brought back that familiar lightness of mind.
Traveling by train, my husband and I stopped in Freshford, a rail station with only a couple of platforms surrounded by fields and pastures. The tiny village we passed through seemed almost abandoned, if not for the flowers that clearly someone took care of, the open windows, a cup on an outdoor table, the cat flaps. But the pub was closed and no one, except a very few tourists we soon lost sight of, was walking on the streets. From there, following paths that wind among woods and crossing bridges, we saw, in the distance, the light reflected on Iford Manor’s 1720 facade.
The silence during our walk was broken by the babble of the river, the chirping of the birds, the buzzing of bees, yet it was soothing, a bath of tranquility where that child still in me could happily swim. 
And happily I went on swimming, running, floating, dancing, me and my soul and the wisteria’s blooms, and the dream, still perfectly alive, that built the garden of Iford Manor, step after step, archway after archway, terrace after terrace, the loggia here, the cloister there, the balcony with its Shakespearean remembrance overlooking the Frome valley, the statues nestled among the roses. 
Harold Peto, the architect who bought Iford in 1899 and gave shape to this amazing gardens, spent part of his life traveling around the world and building up a collection of antiquities and artifacts, some of which can be admired at the Manor. He particularly loved the Italian garden style. When he discovered the house, he said that it reminded him of Villa Giusti in Verona and decided to maintain its structure, adapting his work to its character and already defined atmosphere. I have always been in love with gardens, but I had never felt as much a part of a space as I did in this one. It was a strange sensation, as if I had been there already - maybe due to the Italian references and inspirations - and this was a return, not a first visit. 
Thanks to a limited number of tickets sold for each visit, the Manor being privately owned, it was not the typical overcrowded tourist spot, and even there the sounds of nature were easier to perceive than those of humans. The cafe and restaurant available for visitors are just outside the entrance, close but far enough not to disturb the harmony of the space with echoing chatter and food smells. 
Speaking of smell, a chapter of its own should be given to the wisteria. It was on the house facade and in so many amazing spots around the garden. Its perfume was so intense that it embraced all the terraces, covering even the roses’ scent, its colour painting soft sunrise clouds in every corner that caught the eye. 
I can’t really say what I loved more, perhaps the cloister (it was amazing to discover the door dates from about 1450 and comes from Mantua, Italy), or the staircase at the entrance or the windows. A sense of “ancient peace” (a phrase from Tennyson’s poem “The Palace of Art” inscribed on the inner vault of the cloister) is among the things that will stay with me from this visit, the perfect synthesis of this experience.