The Art of the Folly: Painshill Park and the 18th-century English Garden

Professor Mark Laird, University of Toronto, relates his thirty-year restoration project of the folly gardens at Painshill Park near the city of Cobham in Surrey, a prime example of an 18th-century English landscape park. This remarkable garden was originally created by the house’s owner, the Honourable Charles Hamilton, between 1738 and 1773. Painshill Park is home to numerous follies, including the Turkish Tent, the Gothic Temple, the Mausoleum, the Hermitage, the Grotto, and the Temple of Bacchus, the project’s final reconstruction which is currently underway.