Class heritage

They don't mind spending to get a bit of class at Cambridge University, where, for example, the architecture of their new buildings has long been a cut above average. Also true of many of the civilian buildings.

A correspondent now tells me that King's College has taken to wilding some of their grass and bringing in horses from time to time mow it. Maybe I need to tell our Civic Society or the people at Wisley that they have got a bit of catching up to do.

Could these old implements be modified so that they could cope with all our urban grass? The verges down roads such as ours, or the rather bigger bigger pieces down Longmead Road? Maybe we could enlist horses from the travelling community? One of which, a rather smart looking pony, with a trap, was to be seen in our market place, last Saturday afternoon. Appropriately, just by the 'Evocation of Speed' outdoor art work, as noticed at reference 3.

'... Lawns are a social norm – they have been the dominant form of urban grassland since the early 20th century. A European invention, they arose in the 1770s as a demonstration of wealth and status by landowners who could afford to keep the land out of productivity, and pay labourers to regularly scythe and weed. Lawns are easy to establish and - now that lawnmowers have been invented - to maintain, and have many recreational uses and aesthetic benefits...'.

A fancier story can be found at reference 4 and some science, three years old, at reference 5. The snippet above is from reference 4.

PS 1: quite a lot of places are into wilding their grass these days, for example Hampton Court Palace, Wisley and the Tower of London. But horses is going the extra mile.

PS 2: bat lovers, of whom we have quite a few in Surrey, will be pleased to learn that the authors of the paper at reference 5 discovered no fewer than 9 species of bat feeding in the (then) new meadow. Presumably small bats. I also learn of reference 6, complete with a foreword from Teresa May, where the string 'grass' occurs 11 times among the 151 pages. Important occurrences, naturally.

References

Reference 1: https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/gallery/shire-horses-harvest-wildflower-meadow-34425871.

Reference 2: https://epsomcivicsociety.org.uk/.

Reference 3: https://psmv6.blogspot.com/2026/06/diomed-etc.html.

Reference 4: https://www.cam.ac.uk/stories/kings-wildflower-meadow-a-break-from-the-lawn.

Reference 5: Urban wildflower meadow planting for biodiversity, climate and society: An evaluation at King's College, Cambridge - Cicely A. M. Marshall, Matthew T. Wilkinson, Peter M. Hadfield, Stephen M. Rogers, Jonathan D. Shanklin, Brian C. Eversham, Roberta Healey, Olaf P. Kranse and others - 2023. To be found at: https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2688-8319.12243.

Reference 6: A Green Future: Our 25 Year Plan to Improve the Environment - H M Government - 2018. To be found at https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5ab3a67840f0b65bb584297e/25-year-environment-plan.pdf.