Classic Gardening

It's the perfect combination, I'd say. You find a really lovely garden to wander around, there is a good pub with decent food within stumbling distance, and - if you are lucky - there is a garden centre on hand too - either at the garden you have visited, or nearby.

Selflessly, I have committed a large part of the next decade to finding such places, and to telling you about them. It's dirty work, but someone has to do it. Maybe you have some finds of your own that you'd like to share. If so, do let me know and I'll link to them.

Just to kick things off, here is the first I'd like to share

Waterperry Gardens, Oxfordshire

Great garden
Eight acres of contrasting gardens within a garden, plus a country house complete with frescoes, and it's own little church.

There is The Virgin's Walk, full of snowdrops in spring, leading to a seated figure; a river walk alongside the brown and grumpy Thame; and the long walk between 100m of abundant mixed borders whose informal planting is backed by yew hedges beautifully clipped to attention.

The herbaceous border runs beneath a brick wall of great height and ancestry. Why, there is even a yew Stonehenge taking shape in the meadow, aligned with the sun so that druid gardeners can celebrate the solstice there. Find out all it has to offer here.

Great pub
Ten minutes away on the M40 (I know, but it's worth it, I promise) in Aston Rowant is the Lambert Arms Hotel. Despite being land-locked, it has it's own lighthouse, created in 2002 by the makers of a film called Flight of Fancy (in the UK) and Lighthouse Hill (in the USA), starring Maureen Lipman and John Sessions and making no discernible impact on the great movie-going public. They use lighthouse now to hold a bloody great yellow banner to advertise the hotel to drivers speeding down the M40. Very Route 66. Very Norman Bates.
Don't let that put you off; the hotel is warm and welcoming, with lovely friendly staff and really excellent food. We had one of the best Sunday lunches ever, choosing from homemade mushroom soup, ham terrine and haddock risotto, followed by rib of beef, roast pork or salmon. Only I had room for pudding, and the British cheeses and chutney were first class.
Oh, by the way, you can see a clip from the film (and a glimpse of the lighthouse) here

What about a garden centre?
Oh yes. What I hope for when I've ambled round an inspiring garden is to be abel to buy oen or two of the plants that star in it to take home. No disappointment here. In the nursery beds was a drift of Schizostylis coccinea 'Major' which is, to quote its label "Deep red crocus-liek blooms on spikes" with grassy foliage. And, later, there was Schizo in Waterperry's well-stocked plant centre.
Most of what they sell there, they grew.

What's on
All sorts of talks, demonstrations and guided tours.

How do I get there?
Just walk this way

On Classic Gardening Magazine
...you will find - soon, I hope - a full write up on Waterperry, and a picture slide show of the gardens.

More...