Spring Colour Watch Blog: bright is beautiful
Take a look back over the previous twelve weeks of this year’s Spring Colour Watch Blog, and you’ll see a succession of bold colours.
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From the earliest days of spring, we saw large pink blooms amongst the bare branches of the magnolias. Now, the arboretum is a very much greener place. Leaves are emerging on the oak trees around Circular Drive, providing a lush backdrop to the flame-coloured rhododendrons and deep tones of the bluebells.
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Add a blue sky to the mix and you’ve got quite a kaleidoscope. There are some great views to been seen around the arboretum as the leaves fill out the outline of the landscape.
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Much of this was carefully planned by the arboretum’s original creators from the 1840s onwards. They were following W. S. Gilpin’s picturesque principles of landscape design: picturesque it certainly is and much of the Forestry Commission’s work at Westonbirt today is carefully planned to continue this.
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The biggest of the rhododendrons continue to emerge. Rhododendron ‘Nero’ on Loop Walk and Rhododendron ‘Barbara Wallace’ on Circular Drive look particularly good in the sunshine – we’ve had plenty of that this week!
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Some of Westonbirt’s best loved trees, the Japanese maples from which we take our logo, also sing out in the sun. Acer Glade in the Old Arboretum is a great place to explore with a camera, with leaves which are large and golden, small and red or feathery and green. Take a look at last week’s blog to see how the maples in Silk Wood compare.
Useful links
More information about spring at Westonbirt
Become a member of the Friends of Westonbirt Arboretum
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