In August Simon and I attended a gardening course in Berlin which followed the recent German love affair with herbaceous plants and grasses. But we couldnot go all that way without a visit to the fantastic Garden Park of Sanssouci built for Frederick the Great. The project began on 10 August 1744 and fulfilled his wish to create a series of vine terraces. It is an incredible feat of engineering with convex centres to maximise the sun light .
It is our great luck that the garden has recently been restored with vines growing along the top of each terrace, in low fashion, while tall vines are trained up each tier of the supporting walls,all interplanted with figs.
The Great Fountain was built in 1748 and the marble statues were added soon afterwards.
It looked incredible from the top. It looked incredible as we walked down all the steps (well over 100) and looked even more incredible from down below looking back up the hillside. I loved the curved centres of the terraces, and the curves of the sweeping steps. The yew pyramids acted as great counterpoints.
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