Lunuganga

After my 2004 visit to Sri Lanka and Bevis Bawa's Brief Garden, which was the subject of my last post, from time to time I came upon references to Lunuganga. My first thought was that Brief Garden had been renamed and reopened as a boutique hotel, but I soon discovered that Lunuganga was the country estate of Bevis's brother, Geoffrey. On my return last year, I was able to visit both gardens from my base at Waterside in Bentota.

Our fabulous accommodation at Waterside, Bentota

Crinums growing on Waterside's front lawn.

Geoffrey Bawa was Sri Lanka's and one of Asia's most influential architects. He created the large garden at Lunuganga from what had been an abandoned rubber plantation of about 25 acres. It is an incredibly romantic tropical garden where jungle, paddies and indigenous plants meet Italianate design. The property is situated on a promontory overlooking a lagoon on an estuary of the Bentota River. There are several houses on the property, but I especially love the main residence with its wonderful veranda and views overlooking the water.  Lunuganga is rendolent of the elegant and gracious lifestyle of a man committed to creativity and beauty.

Not far inside the entrance is the Garden Room, with the Glass House in the background

There is the same wonderful placement of urns and garden sculpture to provide definition to the different  garden rooms and vistas that I saw at Brief Garden.

Estate workers cleaning out the Water Garden

This leopard sculpture by Lydia Duchin marks the Water Gate, the departure point for excursions on to the lake and neighbouring islands.

The Hindu Pan

The urn on the right was designed by Bevis Bawa and Australian artist, Donald Friend

From Cinnamon Hill looking towards the main house.

The southern terrace

The southern view (with orchid in flower on the tree)

The Northern Terrace. The frangipanis, planted in 1947 when work first commenced on the garden, are as large as I have seen.

The front veranda of the main house

Brief Garden

These statue-topped gateposts mark the entrance to one of the loveliest private gardens in Sri Lanka, Bevis Bawa's Brief Garden, situated about 10 kilometres inland from Bentota on Sri Lanka's west coast. 

Here is the journalist, travel writer and nephew of W. Somerset Maugham, Robin Maugham's description:

'Brief Garden is a Paradise; it is a Shangri-la, a glimpse of Nirvana--call it what you will after you have been to see it. The harmony of the Brief Garden is unexpected because, as Bevis Bawa explains it, it consists of a collection of several small gardens--thought out by him in various moods and at various times during its growth over the last forty years. The result is a climax of loveliness, a proclamation that nature can triumph over the hideous inventions of mankind.

'In the leafy trees and shrubs the wild birds call and sing. Flowers glitter in the sunshine. Gracefully-shaped vistas reach out to the horizon. Tranquility pervades the green terraces. Peace covers the house with a soft cloak. Peace fall over the lawns like a blessing. Peace is everywhere. For this place is a Paradise, made by the sensibility of one man, created by his patience and his love.'

The man behind Brief Garden, Bevis Bawa, began landscaping the 5 acre garden his father had purchased following a successful legal brief, in 1929 and continued until his death in 1992. From all accounts, he was an amazing character - artist, wit, raconteur and garden designer. For sixty years his home attracted the rich and famous, including Lawrence Olivier,Vivian Leigh, and King Edward VIII, and was a haven for artists from around the world, such as Australia's Donald Friend, who came for six days and ended up staying six years. And who could blame him!

As I mentioned in an earlier post on Helga's Folly in Candy, I first visited Sri Lanka in 2004, the year of the terrible tsunami, and I finally had the opportunity to return last year. My first visit was prior to my conversion to digital photography, but this trip in 2011 marked the end of the road for my digital camera, which had served me faithfully in the intervening five or six years. So, with apologies for the photo quality (it was clearly on its last legs), here are some of the images I brought back from my return visit to Sri Lanka and Brief Garden.

These beautiful newlyweds kindly consented to being photographed.

Torch ginger

The Moon Gate - a traditional architectural element in Chinese gardens

'In the land where the jaggery grow...Bawa of Brief'

There are so many fabulous ideas to be gleaned from a visit to Brief Garden: the curved steps and garden seats, the plantings, the sweeping terraces, the garden rooms, the perfect placement of garden statues and urns, and the vistas from every room of the beautiful residence.

Perhaps one of the factors that spurred Bevis on when creating his Shangri La was the spirit of sibling rivalry, because not far from Brief Garden and Bentota lies another stunning garden called Lunuganga, the home and garden of his brother, esteemed architect, Geoffrey Bawa. I look forward to sharing my images of that with you soon.