Pitmedden Estate and Farming Life Museum

The flag of Pitmedden is red with the Scottish flag in the top corner and a heart with two tears on the red field. 

Pitmedden Estate was laid out in the mid-1600's.  In 1675, Sir Alexander Seton built the walled garden.  Over the next 200 years the land use changed from agricultural to woodlands and pasture.  In the 1950's the National Trust for Scotland set about recreating the gardens from designs of the 17th century.  This involved extensive leveling and drainage.  

The entrance to the walled garden.

 Shaped cypress in a row, with boxwood hedges beds in the back.

Today there are over 5 miles of boxwood hedge arranged in intricate patterns, forming six distinctive areas. The designs are filled with 40,000 colorful annuals during the summer months.  There are many volunteers who help with this task.

We have not seen words formed in boxwood before.

Time Flies.

Several areas of the boxwood hedge have been severely pruned because of blight.  They hope the pruning with cut out the damaged areas and allow healthy new growth.  Fingers crossed!

Ornate fleur de lis.

Not only is the garden walled, but it is sunken.

The Scottish Thistle and Flag, all in boxwood with the correct color flowers blooming in the middle.

A deep purple artichoke; we counted 11 varieties being grown.

On one side above the garden is a kitchen garden.  There were more varieties of artichoke than we knew existed.  We counted 11, just by the difference in leaves, growth and choke, but there could have been more that we could not differentiate.

This artichoke was very tall and large.

An arbor where each rib was a different variety of apple.

The Estate is known for it's collection of 72 different varieties of apples.  In the fall, one is able to come and buy their apples to make your own goodies.

All you need to process the milk from your cows.

In a large barn and farmyard on the estate is the Farming Life Museum.  The last owner of the estate collected items as farms were sold off to larger and more modern concerns.  These are now showcased to tell the story of a long gone way of life.

A ride on spring toothed harrow, now where's the horse?

There is a lovely stone cottage as well.  It is full of all the things needed to run a house and raise a family in the 1800's.

A cradle by the fire to keep the baby warm.

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