Plaque

{Below a drawing which shows the layout of the garden:}
St John's Lodge was completed in 1819. The grounds had an informal layout until the 3rd Marquess of Bute purchased the lease in 1888. Lord Bute commissioned Robert Weir Shultz {sic} to carry out works to the villa and grounds including making "a garden fit for meditation".

Weir Shultz arranged distinctly shaped spaces on the axis of the villa. Formed by hedges, these enclosures remain the framework for the garden. He extended the villa forecourt into a sunken lawn, with large rusticated stone piers at the corners (boys on each support Bute family coats of arms) and scalloped hedges along the edges. The lawn led up steps to a circular garden of mixed borders and a central statue of St John the Baptist. An oval tennis lawn beyond, was reached through a large stone loggia of classical design. The axis terminated at a nymphaeum; a semi-domed temple within a tight circle of lime trees. Garden features reflected both Arts and Crafts ideas and the late nineteenth-century revival of classical art.

To the south were kitchen and rose gardens, paddocks, and to the north side a gravel walk. These and the stone loggia and nymphaeum were lost during a decline between the wars. The central statue was replaced by "Hylas and the Nymph" and the "Shepherdess" statue was introduced. The villa and outbuildings were used as a hospital for disabled officers, St Dunstan's Institute for the Blind, and eventually the garden became public in 1928. Despite changes, the garden core retains the quiet reflective mood intended by Lord Bute.

In 1994, the Royal Parks undertook works to strengthen and enhance the character of the garden and accommodate a new axis walk brought about by change of use for St John's Lodge. Elements of the original concept have been re-introduced; there is a new gravel walk with a circle of lime trees around a stone urn at one end and the "Shepherdess" at the other. New planting throughout increases seasonal interest and variety, and clipped yew hedges replace old privet. A pergola with climbers takes the place of the lost loggia, and a covered seat forms the focal point to the axis where the nymphaeum once stood.