Refined Decay in Launde Abbey Gardens

We are spending the weekend at a Nature Photographers' weekend  at Launde Abbey, an Elizabethan manor house, extensively modified, originally built on the site of an Augustinian priory.Thomas Cromwell owned but never lived in the house but his son, Gregory, lived at Launde Abbey for ten years before it passed to other families. Finally, in 1957, Cecil Coleman and his wife purchased the abbey and presented it to the Diocese of Leicester. They paid for the conversion works to make it into a retreat house. It has extensive grounds including a splendid wall garden with a fairly derelict greenhouse complete with negelected peppers, tomatoes, cacti, flowers etc. Phil and I spent a couple of hours there on Saturday playing with double exposures etc.