Ten luxury hotels with glorious gardens
Born in Ireland, Robinson moved to England in 1861 and worked for the Royal Botanic Society's Gardens in Regent's Park before founding an influential journal, The Garden, and writing the bestsellers The Wild Garden and The English Flower Garden. From 1884, as the owner of Gravetye Manor in Sussex, he was able to put his revolutionary ideas into practice, recording his journey in Twenty Years' Work round an Old Manor House, republished last year with a foreword by Gravetye's head gardener, Tom Coward (Rizzoli, £60).
Luckily for us, Robinson's gardens can today be visited. Even better, they are now part of a gracious hotel that turns the garden's edibles into Michelin-starred food. Nor is Gravetye Manor the only luxury hotel with an exceptional garden from which ingredients are picked. Here are ten of Britain's loveliest.
Among the highlights of Gravetye's 35-acre gardens is the flower garden with its mixed border of year-round colour. Those staying in the 17 classically styled rooms and suites, or dining in the glass-fronted restaurant, can take a tour or explore the wildflower meadows and 1,000 acres of woodland. The restaurant and 'Holly' bedroom have beautiful hand-painted panels by the French artist Claire Basler.
Garden to table: The unique 1.5-acre elliptical walled garden, peach house and extensive orchards grow much of the produce used in the Michelin-starred kitchen, run since April by the Roux scholarship-holding chef Martin Carabott. B&B doubles from £405; three-course lunch from £80, gravetyemanor.co.uk
The arts and crafts garden designer Rosemary Verey was known for turning the potager into a thing of beauty so her former home and garden were a shoo-in for the stylish Pig hotel group with a focus on locally and home-grown produce. The 17th-century, Grade II-listed former rectory houses six country-chic rooms, with a further seven in the Stable Yard and 11 set between the laburnum walk, knot gardens, many-layered flower beds and magical views to the countryside.Garden to table: The kitchen garden is at the heart of the hotel's seasonal 25-mile menuDoubles from £415; two-course lunch from £28, thepighotel.com
Raymond Blanc has long been a champion of all things local, seasonal and sustainable and the restaurant at this 32-room historic manor house — which has held on to its two Michelin stars for an astonishing 40 years — is rooted in the 27 acres that surround it. The 11 gardens also include a wildflower, water and Japanese garden. Courses in edible gardens and apple pressing are available.Garden to table: Organic produce from the hotel's two acres of kitchen gardens and 2,500 fruit trees resurface in outstanding food and cocktails.Doubles from £955 b&b lunch from £150, belmond.com
At the heart of this 2,000-acre estate is a baroque maze of espaliered apple trees called the Parabola. Around it unfurl 30 acres of colour, cottage and other gardens — reimagined by the Italian-French designer Patrice Taravella from designs by Penelope Hobhouse and Nori and Sandra Pope — which in turn are surrounded by 65 acres of apple orchards and swathes of ancient woodland. Tours are available for guests and members.
Garden to table: Produce from the one-acre kitchen garden and 20-plus acres of market garden are showcased in the Garden Café, Botanical Rooms (at the 23-room Hadspen House) and Kitchen at the 17-room Farmyard, ten minutes away by bike or buggy.B&B doubles from £785; two-course lunch at the Garden Café from £27, thenewtinsomerset.com
Gertrude Jekyll was a leading light of Victorian garden design, world-famous for working with the arts and crafts architect Sir Edwin Lutyens. Her Italian gardens at this Scottish baronial castle are the centrepiece of the 110 acres of manicured grounds, woodland and several champion trees. It's all set in a Unesco biosphere, with views over the Firth of Clyde to Ailsa Craig.
Garden to table: Guests staying in the 21 traditional rooms and suites can enjoy dinner, Sunday lunch and tea at the Azalea, a magnificent Moncur & McKenzie glasshouse in the walled kitchen garden, overlooking the azalea pond.B&B doubles from £625; three-course dinner at the Azalea from £58, glenappcastle.com
The Chelsea Gold medallist Jinny Blom approaches landscape design like an artist, so she was the ideal choice for the intimate garden at this 46-room hotel stuffed with 16,000 works of art. Taking her cue from the surrounding landscape, she created a mini Cairngorms of rocky landforms and native Scottish plants, which extends from the back of the former Victorian coaching inn to a wildflower meadow on the River Clunie.Garden to table: There's no kitchen garden but the Clunie Dining Room uses seasonal ingredients — nettles, sorrel, yarrow, wild raspberries — foraged from the surrounding Highlands.Doubles from £525; two-course dinner at the Clunie Dining Room from £43, thefifearms.com
The grade II listed home of the landscape designer Arne Maynard and his partner William Collinson isn't exactly a luxury hotel, but it is one of the most special places to stay in the UK. The terracotta-hued medieval farmhouse with its Renaissance tower has been restored by the Spitalfield Trust and sits in four acres of clipped topiary, tumbling roses and meadow planting, melding into the deep-green hills beyond — a SSSI with views to the Brecon Beacons and Black Mountains. The interiors, which include two large ensuite doubles, are a poetic journey into the past.Garden to table: Home-cooked breakfasts in the farmhouse kitchen draw on produce from the kitchen garden; the jam is delicious.B&B doubles from £240, two-night minimum stay, arnemaynard.com
This Georgian country-house hotel with its 46 dreamily designed rooms, suites and cottage is also a model of sustainability. The 438 acres include gardens created in the late 19th century by the horticulturalist William Wildsmith and now overseen by the head gardener Liz Reay. The walled garden leads to the secluded Bothy by Wildsmith spa and the fields are full of wildflowers.
Garden to table: Skye Gyngell's restaurants — including the green Michelin-starred Marle — make use of produce from the seven greenhouses in the biodynamic market garden, 500 fruit trees and home farm. B&B doubles from £600; lunch and dinner at Marle from £71, heckfieldplace.com
'There aren't many places in England left like it,' says the owner Olga Polizzi of this former historic hunting lodge, set in 108 idyllic acres of romantic gardens laid out in the early 19th century by Humphrey Repton, with woodlands, follies, grottoes and the Tamar River running through it. Remarkably, Repton's original scheme, now under the stewardship of the head gardener and blogger Ben Ruscombe-King, is pretty much intact. The irrigation system, together with the sound of birdsong, provides the soundtrack to a stay in one of the 21 elegantly poetic rooms.
Garden to table: Repton's plan included a walled kitchen garden, but it was never realised. Ingredients are sourced from farms in the local area — including the fabulous Devon cream for scones at teatime. B&B doubles from £355; three-course dinner from £75, thepolizzicollection.com
The showstopper at this stateliest of gardens, now owned and maintained by the National Trust, is the extraordinary six-acre parterre of box-and yew-framed triangular beds that rolls down to a semi-circular bed on the Thames. It was created in 1849 by John Fleming, a Victorian pioneer of carpet and ribbon bedding. Other highlights of the 376-acre estate include a yew maze, the Long Garden full of topiary and statuary and the outdoor pool where John Profumo met Christine Keeler in 1961. The equally grand house has been leased as a hotel since 1985. Inside, its 47 rooms and suites are a period drama of panelled walls, sparkling chandeliers and oil paintings.Garden to table: A kitchen garden provides fruit, vegetables and herbs for the hotel and cookery school.B&B doubles from £445, clivedenhouse.co.uk
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