Hello, I'm Lucy Worsley, chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces.

You're listening to our podcast that explores the history and stories of our six palaces.

These talks are a collection of some of our best live events.

I really hope you enjoy listening.

The history of the English Garden reveals more than expected about the past and its people.

This series explores the theme of gardens as places of work, rest and leisure.

In this talk, landscape architect Robert Myers describes the personality of the magic garden

at Hampton Court Palace as a playful space for children.

So this project started life in about January 2012 when Michael Day, who's the chief executive of the historic royal palaces,

had the idea, it's very much his brainchild, this project, to turn this space into a garden

for children. And I think the way they've approached this project as a client in terms of

setting the brief for this garden,

it's really been quite unusual and innovative for a historic visitor attraction of this nature.

So this isn't just your sort of average playground tacked on to a historic house with some springy chickens and maybe if you're lucky a sort of timber timber castle um this is um as i say a garden for children and the brief was very clear

that it needed to capture to explore and play with the personality of hampton court

palace in a way that actually leaves a lasting impression on people who come here.

So rather than being a standalone attraction that, as I say, is just bolted on,

this should be a place that very much grows out of the character, the history,

the myths, the legends that we've just been hearing about at Hampton Court Palace,

that it should reinforce, in one

sense, things you might have seen on a visit to the palace, on a visit to the gardens, you come

here and you find those things again, but in a magical way, in a playful way that's reinterpreted

...