Park of the week

113. Minchenden Oak Garden 

This is a small, well-hidden walled garden in Southgate. Entry is through a narrow, unsignposted gap in the wall onto the main road. Inside, it’s a mix of lawn with raised beds along the wall, shrubs, and a variety of trees. There’s a sunken area to one side that might be a drained pond or an empty sunken garden. Dotted around are pieces of carved stone, remnants from the former seventeenth-century Weld Chapel that was attached to the church next door.

The garden used to be part of the estate of Minchenden House, built in 1740 and demolished in 1853. The estate was sold off in the 1930s for housing, which fills most of the area now. The space was opened as a garden of remembrance, in 1934.

Part of the reason the garden was created is the oak tree that stands in the middle – the Minchenden Oak, thought to be 800-years old and a survivor of the ancient Forest of Middlesex. It’s one of the oldest in London. The canopy of the tree was described as the largest in England in 1873. The tree canopy is smaller these days owing to its age, for example two limbs were lost in a gale in 1899 and the tree was badly pruned after that.

In 2013, rot was discovered inside the main trunk and, the canopy was cut back to reduce the weight. The timber was reused in the garden for the benches. To insure against a future loss of the oak, a sapling grown from one of its acorns was planted in May 2015, at the same time as some restoration work was carried out on the rest of the park. The tree is surrounded by a low fence.

I get the impression that the garden is never very crowded as it’s in a residential area of London with only local residents and the local school for regular users. When we were there, we were the only people, and I took the time to sit and relax on one of the many benches. This map shows where it is, not that you can tell. You need to find house number 144 and then walk along the brick wall next to it till you find the doorway.

Judith Field

Minchenden Oak Garden  Waterfall Rd, Arnos Grove, London N14 7JN