North Yorkshire retains a good number of former monasteries around its hills and, at Mount St John, near Felixkirk, the outlines of a preceptory of the Knights Hospitaller can be seen in the park just below the garden, with York Minster a smudge on the far horizon. The present house, which dates from 1720, was built on the site of the 12th-century ‘Commandery on Mount Hill’ and overlooks the Vale of York.
The site’s many blessings (including protective woodland behind the house) had, sadly, not resulted in a joyous garden when Yorkshire businessman and former trustee of the RHS Chris Blundell and his wife, Jill, moved here 26 years ago. Old photographs show acres of steeply sloping lawns that made little use of the south-facing position and the walled garden lay unkempt and uncared for. This last did not remain derelict for long. Kitchen and cutting gardens now operate at full throttle, supplying the pubs and inns, including the local in Felixkirk, that form part of Blundell’s portfolio. The remainder of the 20-acre garden and the parkland, he knew, would need some outside help. The answer came in 2001, when the landscape designer Tom Stuart-Smith was awarded his first Gold medal at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. Blundell looked no further.
Acres of sloped formal lawn have been replaced, in a design by Tom Stuart-Smith, by repeating perennial plantings on a scale befitting the dramatic view to the Vale of York.
Stuart-Smith’s contribution has been to develop Mount St John’s garden (including a ravine on the west side) into a contemporary pleasure ground. He has fulfilled his brief and more, with a client who is a highly energetic plant enthusiast and clearly embraces the idea that a garden is never finished. Part of the plan was to leave space for at least one marquee, to which end a series of formal flower gardens with expansive lawns unfold as they descend in two generous terraces from the Palladian house, culminating in a curved ha-ha. The lowest level, edged by immaculate stone walls, resembles an infinity pool, hanging over the paddocks and fields that spread out below. Extensive earthworks were carried out to balance the garden with the surroundings including the striking outline of Sutton Bank, looming over the nearby Hambleton Hills. It’s a monumental size, at about three acres on this south side. ‘Mount St John had to be big because the view is so awe-inspiring,’ explains Stuart-Smith. ‘It would be easy for a garden to feel very feeble in the face of those views.’
Whereas the flower garden creates a sense of occasion, a different kind of formality is at play over the hedge. Precision-cut yew is fringed with a wide canal of Miscanthus sinensis, an introduction to the broad strokes of prairie perennials, grasses and domed topiaries that are repeated on the grand scale, from a gravel garden at the top to a parterre sliced with lawn paths at the bottom. It is carried out with the kind of panache one expects from Stuart-Smith, making an unlikely, but seamless connection between the recently built house extension and the miles of farmland below.
The colours and textures of the planting are designed to echo the distant trees and the changing colours in the landscape.
Generally called the Meadow Garden, the design here reflects Stuart-Smith’s interest, at the time of making, in using landscape pattern in a garden’s layout. This one was partly inspired by an Ordnance Survey map from the 1870s. ‘I was very interested in the garden being a condensation of landscape pattern,’ he recalls. Beyond the park’s edge, the old field pattern was used to form lines of planting within the garden, starting with the ribbons of miscanthus that run through the parterre on the bottom terrace. It hardly matters that, after 20 years, this pattern is barely traceable; it created ‘a nice constraint’ and a guide in how to plant it.
The prospect from the meadow garden is more wooded than it is from the lawned terraces, which overlook parkland. On this eastern side, a series of domed beech topiaries make a graphic connection between the garden and the trees below. The clipped beech tumps effectively mimic distant tree canopies and their slowly changing autumn foliage adds richness to the developing scenery. Likewise, the colours and textures playing out in the perennials on the descending terraces interact with the farming seasons in the fields below.
On looking back to the house, the tumps also mark the beginning of a planting diagonal, continued in domes of box and repeats of hawthorn, Crataegus x lavalleei ‘Carrierei’, cutting across the axial pattern made by the terraces. Contrast is key at Mount St John and the meadow garden also takes time to pause with a large and narrowly rectangular pool with a plain wooden deck, its stillness enhanced by the slightest smattering of water lilies across its surface.
Stuart-Smith’s way with hard materials adds extra refinement to the landscape of giant perennials, as well as fitting seamlessly among more conventional lawns and flowers. Holding walls have flat tops for walking on, creating changing perspectives across the garden. Next to the great arms of yew that are the site’s partitions, simple lines of sandstone make a beguiling tracery, leading sometimes to dead ends and at others to viewpoints: the flower garden offers a tantalising glimpse down a steep bank to the valley garden, which is the continually evolving counterpart to Stuart-Smith’s original 2004 design.
The former stew ponds in the valley garden, which provided fish for the Knights Hospitaller, have been cleared, sealed and restocked.
The remains of three stew ponds, where fish were kept for the tables of the Knights Hospitaller, had lapsed into giant puddles that Blundell and a team of gardeners sealed using clay from the surrounding ravine, which is well supplied with springs. Brambles and weed trees were removed from the edges of the reinvigorated and restocked ponds, and planting began. Although Stuart-Smith has been involved in the development of the valley garden, the area has been mainly in the hands of Blundell and his head gardener, until recently Tim Marshall.
An experienced plantsman, who had worked with the Dutch landscape designer Piet Oudolf as well as on previous occasions with Stuart-Smith, Marshall was as delighted as his employer by the possibilities of the site. The valley garden is sheltered by old sycamores — eventually to be replaced by beech and oak — creating a microclimate that has opened up opportunities for rarer species. Sourcing plants from Bleddyn and Sue Wynn-Jones at Crûg Farm Plants near Caernarfon has been part of the pleasure in steering this area of the garden. Discussions are in progress about planting a middle storey to balance the existing Scots pines.
The valley garden is traced with paths and the ponds are crossed with stepping stones, creating more viewpoints in this garden of views. From certain angles, the magnificent Sutton Bank hoves into view, but this is mostly an inward-looking garden, a place apart, where the enjoyable discussion of plants and ideas continues to engage Blundell, his family and the gardeners.
The garden at Mount St John is private, but does hold occasional open days — follow them on Instagram for the latest details and dates.
This feature originally appeared in the September 9, 2026, print edition of Country Life. Click here for more information on how to subscribe.