Cherry Ingram and Japanese cherries
In 1919, the Ingram family moved to Benenden in Kent where The Grange, a substantial Victorian house, had a large, but little developed garden. Perhaps in a mood of post-war renewal, Collingwood stopped work on his book on the Birds of France (only part was published, as Birds of the Riviera in 1926) and turned his talents and energies to the Grange garden. Two existing large and beautiful flowering cherries in the garden, together with his love of the people and culture of Japan, led him to begin a collection of Japanese cherries. Before long he was a world authority and came to be known throughout the gardening world as "Cherry Ingram". Over the next decades his contribution to the survival and popularity of Japanese cherries was immense, and in 2019 this contribution is marked by a new book.
A new book
'Cherry' Ingram:
The Englishman who saved Japan's Blossoms
by Naoko Abe
Published by Chatto & Windus on 21 March 2019
(and in the USA by Knopf Doubleday as The Sakura Obsession)
website.
The book describes the place of flowering cherries in the history
and culture of Japan and Cherry Ingram's key role in the survival of the old village varieties,
including the rescue from extinction of the great white cherry
BBC Radio 4 Book of
the Week.
March 18th - 22nd
2019!