This elegant example of the Chinese Red birch in the Winter Garden owes it sinuous shape to having its leader lopped to the ground as a young tree. With a Hydra-like response, three trunks then grew up to take the place of the original which makes the most of the beautiful copper, milky pink, cinnamon and pale pewter bark.
Where the bark peels away, the fluttering rags glisten gold in the sun and visitors unable to resist touching the trunks, buff the colours till they gleam. The tree emerges from a deep green sea of ivy that is studded with spring bulbs from February on.