With plenty of warm long days still ahead of us, there’s no better time to visit a beautiful garden than now.
Not only can visiting a garden be a fun day out for families, couples and singletons, but spending time amongst nature can have wondrous benefits for our mental (and physical) health too.
There’s hundreds green gardens outside our doors waiting to be explored. However, trying to pin down the best ones to visit in your area can be tricky and even more so if you’re looking to visit a new area.
Top 10 most famous and beautiful gardens in the British Isles
- Sissinghurst, a garden made famous by Vita Sackville West.
- Great Dixter, planted creatively and unconventionally by Christopher Lloyd.
- Hidcote Manor Garden, an Arts and Crafts gem by the great horticulturist Major Lawrence Johnston.
- The Lost Gardens of Heligan a great garden restoration by Tim Smit.
- Bodnant Gardens in Wales created by Henry Pochin and now managed by the National Trust.
- Kew Gardens on the outskirts of London one of the finest Botanical gardens in the world.
- Inverewe Gardens on the West Coast of Scotland created a lochside amid a barren wilderness.
- Levens Hall in the Lake District with its world famous topiary gardens.
- Stourhead is considered to be the finest landscape Garden in Britain.
- Kiftsgate Cout Gardens - A beautiful romantic garden in the Cotswolds.
If you're on the hunt for the best gardens to visit near you, there are lots of great websites that can narrow down your search. Here are some of our favourites…
The National Trust
The National Trust is a conservation charity that has been caring for areas of outstanding beauty for 125 years, looking after more than 200 gardens and parks in the UK.
Their website has a fantastic page detailing the top gardens across England and Wales, so you’re bound to find a glorious garden near you.
The National Trust for Scotland also has a great page with the best gardens to visit, from Threave Garden in Dumfries & Galloway to Inverewe Garden in Wester Ross.
The Royal Horticultural Society
The leading garden charity has a clever search tool where you can pop in your postcode and it will come up with a list of gorgeous gardens.
The search results will even tell you how far away the gardens are, what facilities they’ve got (such as toilets, parking, a gift shop and cafe), as well as whether entry is free or paying.
The National Garden Scheme
The National Garden Scheme opens beautiful privately owned gardens on selected dates across England and Wales for charity.
Just like the Royal Horticultural Society, the website has a postcode search tool, so you can find garden’s near you that you’ll be opening. But in addition to this, you can also enter when you’re planning to visit - for example, if it’s in the next day, the coming weekend or next 28 days.
Each search will also tell you what facilities are available at each garden and give you the option to book there and then.
Great British Gardens
On the Great British Garden’s website you can search by postcode, town or county to find the best gardens near you. It also has a fantastic guide to the best gardens to visit in the British Isles.
They also have plenty of different sections on the website with roundups of the different types of gardens you may like to visit, whether that’s a ‘family garden’, ‘royal garden’, 'dog friendly garden', or even ‘cottage gardens’.
If you’re someone who likes to have a sit down and have a good read about a place before visiting, then this website is for you.