My Favourite Place: Hauser & Wirth, Somerset

The Hauser & Wirth family has art galleries in places such as Zurich and New York, and for Somerset they wanted something that was a real draw so they commissioned Piet Oudolf to design the garden spaces, and the first exhibit in the gallery was his drawings. It was planted in April and I shot it in September.

The great thing for me was the challenge. As a photographer you compose pictures and look for leading lines and structure. Traditionally you would have structure in paths, topiary and statuary, but this is different as the structure is within the planting itself.

The Oudolf Field at Hauser & Wirth works as a tapestry, that’s how I read it. Each element performs against a backdrop of other plants. Soft grasses such as sporobolus form a textured haze, with the seed heads as incredible, dark punctuation points. When the sun dips behind the trees the light just kisses sections of the garden, creating highlights that keep the detail and give a touch of warmth, while the shadows hold their own.

My favourite time in this garden is winter. It’s really unusual in how spectacular it is, and a real eyeopener when many people are so keen on cutting back their plants. But when Piet Oudolf lays out a garden, he also thinks about how it will look as its starts to decay.

There’s a glory in decay; the colours alter, it’s sublime. You get the warm highlights and the cool shadows; the hot and the cold. On a frosty day the ice covers the plumes of grass and the seed heads with a sheen of cool blue, then where the sun hits it melts into lovely, warm tones. It holds up well, even when it’s not a frosty day!

When I was at art college, I had a passion for photographing landscapes. They kept me in the studio as much as possible but I always wanted to be outside. I approach the Oudolf Field by using the garden as foreground interest and taking in the sky and wider landscape elements. I like to show the context.

■ Hauser & Wirth, Durslade Farm, Dropping Lane, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0NL www.hauserwirth.com.

Photographer Jason Ingram visits many beautiful places, but one of his favourites is Hauser & Wirth in Bruton, Somerset. Planting the Oudolf Gardens at Hauser & Wirth Somerset is out now.