In the beginning...

Beyond The Wall....

Beyond the Wall blog will track the progress of the development of this beautiful walled garden set in the depths of Northumberland.  The garden has a new custodian, Matt Scouler; Gardener to many beautiful places and now a viticulture expert in the making!

Who is Matt??? He started his career as a tree surgeon working across the UK, Ireland and Australia where he 'hacked' trees mainly for the electricity board (not in Oz, they were good professional blokes).  Not satisfied with this he moved away from utility tree work and began a career closer to home working for various private companies. With the aches and pains of a career climber and concerns of how long he could continue, he began working part time and started to maintain several gardens, starting his own business.  After building up enough work to maintain a lifestyle business, he began to look into ways he could gain access to land for his own uses.  This blog marks the journey into his first 'interesting' use of land.

In the beginning......

....there was a feeling but could of been mistaken for an urge, to get land, any land, any option to do something related to 'what I do' in the words of Matt.  Something involving horticulture or forestry.  After finding some land, he asked a respected customer and now friend for some advice, the land fell through but the discussion on Matt's ideas and dreams continued. 

Whilst walking in Northumberland, our friend Mr Fallon came across an unused walled garden which housed some chickens and a few mature fruit trees.  With Matt's interests in mind, Mr Fallon began investigating the possibility of gaining use of the land.  After discussions with the land owner, who was very keen to see it be put to good use, an agreement was made on Saturday 4th May 2013.

The idea is to use this garden and it's microclimate with it's main function being a vineyard. 

A vineyard????

After Matt had great success at growing grapes on a South facing wall at home using a German White Grapevine, the walled garden seemed like a good opportunity to set up a vineyard.