Sweet Smells: The Fragrance Garden

Fragrance gardens were very important to a Tudor manor like Agecroft. The sweet-smelling flowers and herbs that would be grown in the fragrance garden would be used for cleaning and making perfumes.

As we saw in the post on cleaning, herbs were often strewn on the floors. Herbs like rosemary and thyme would be grown and gathered from the fragrance garden. The fragrance garden would often be put in close to the house. This would make it easier to gather the herbs and flowers from the garden. It would also allow the people who lived in the manor house to open the window and allow the fresh air and sweet smells from the gardens fill the house. This is why the fragrance garden at Agecroft Hall and Gardens today is located so close to the house. The mistress and her daughters might go into the garden to gather flowers for their tussie mussie. Sometime also called nosegays, a tussie mussie is a little bouquet of flowers and herbs. Women would often carry them and hold them in front of their noses if the encountered something (or someone!) who didn’t smell good.