Designed & stocked in the UK
Pentlebay is based in Hertfordshire in the UK. All Pentlebay clothes are designed & stocked in the UK.

Discovery

Great British Gardens

Gotha Gardens

Having just organised a photoshoot where we took some pictures in a beautiful local garden, I was really taken by surprise at how many gardens there are out there to visit in the area that I didn’t know existed.

When trying to find a great location to get some pictures taken locally I started googling local gardens. I was under the impression that what was out there was probably too big and expensive for us to use and probably owned by the National Trust or other such organisation. Having called the National Trust to enquire, we found the hourly rate to take pictures at a venue was slightly out of our budget! Luckily, I came across a number of websites listing smaller gardens in the uk to visit. It turns out as a nation of garden lovers, we have more gardens open to the public than anywhere else in the world!

I have listed some of the websites to check out below.

The national open gardens scheme website - ngs.org.uk - gives visitors access to over 3,500 private gardens in England and Wales and the contributions you pay to visit the gardens raises money for a number of charities. You can search by location or county and can view all the gardens open to visit near you this summer!

Usually you will need to pre-book but some will also let you just turn up on the day and charge around £5 per adult and children go free. Many offer small tea rooms to stop for a well earned tea or coffee and cake after a browse around the beautiful garden. Most of the gardens are open regularly a few days a week and generally weekends; others have certain open days during the year on which you can visit. You may need to book these in advance so you need to check out the details for each venue.

Gotha Gardens driveway

Another great website that lists private gardens alongside the larger gardens open to the public is www.greatbritishgardens.co.uk

Tresco Abbey Gardens

This covers all of the UK and is a great way to search all the places by county. Some larger National Trust gardens are listed and also smaller privately owned gardens such as Gotha Gardens at Pembroke Farm where our pictures were taken for our last photoshoot.

In my county of Hertfordshire, Benington Lordship garden near Stevenage is on my list to visit and has a number of dates coming up on which the gardens are open and you can pre-book.

Cornwall has some beautiful gardens listed if you get a chance to go. Some of the ones that I have visited include the Lost Gardens of Heligan, Trelissick Gardens near Truro and St. Michaels Mount gardens (both National Trust), and also Tresco Abbey Gardens on the Isles of Scilly.

Visit England lists English gardens, along with the RHS website. There are also some other smaller websites such as www.gardenvisit.com.

It's definitely worth a look anyway to see what you can find in your area and appreciate the beautiful gardens we have in this country. Sometimes you just want a new lovely place to meet for a coffee in a great setting. It also gets you off the beaten track to some quieter venues so you can avoid the crowds and be able to listen to birdsong and stop and take time to appreciate the views.

Clare sign off
10% OFF
10% off your first order with us
Create a Pentlebay account and get 10% off your first order with us.
Create an account now