PGW(Gm)35(GLA)

Italian Gardens  

II  

01/02/2022  

Designated  

Vale of Glamorgan  

Penarth  

318869  

171165  

Gardens, Parks and Urban Spaces  

Urban public garden  

1926  

Despite modern additions, the Italian Gardens is registered for its historic interest as a well preserved Edwardian-style public garden in a fine setting on the sea front. The gardens were laid out and opened in 1926. Designed principally as a rock garden, its original layout and structural planting is retained. The initiative to develop the gardens came from Mrs Constance Maillard, of the Urban District Council, who consulted Ursula Thompson, the first woman to graduate from Kew Gardens. Mrs Maillard instigated a design for the garden by Wilfred Evans, who had made a rock garden at Llanishen. This design survives more or less intact. The Italian Gardens occupy a narrow strip of land on the landward side of the Esplanade in central Penarth, on gently sloping ground (formerly used for boathouses) that has been levelled into two terraces. Above, the ground rises steeply to Windsor Gardens at the top of the cliff. The lower terrace, flanked by sloping flower beds, is a tarmac walk, with benches, bounded by the curving limestone rockwork edges of the flowerbeds on either side which also features cordylines and a Chusan palm. The upper terrace, accessed by steps flanked by Irish yews, is a long straight walk of random paving stones, backed by a roughly coursed dry-stone wall. The terrace supports a small rockery bed (at the south end), a sundial base, modern planters and benches. The terrace continues along the north side of the garden, leading to a platform with a low parapet wall and bench. The garden, surrounded by iron railings, was always intended as a rock garden, and early photographs of the 1930s and 1950s show the layout of the garden to be unchanged since then. Significant views - the garden affords extensive sea views. Source: Cadw 2000: Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in Wales, Glamorgan (ref: PGW(Gm)35(GLA)).