The 10 best shrubs for your garden, by the legendary gardener who’s dedicated his life to them
The revered gardener Peter Catt has bred and grown some of the finest shrubs in Britian. He told Val Bourne about his ten favourites.
Alan Titchmarsh: A foolproof guide to growing wisteria
The plant might not be evergreen, but Alan's advice for how to make it thrive certainly is.
The ultimate guide to planting your own orchard
‘Getting it right is easy,' explains Mark Diacono. 'Sadly, so is getting it wrong.’
The best garden designers and landscapers in Britain
Not all garden designers understand that a country house and its surroundings must work in harmony. Here's our list of the very best who do.
Kylemore Abbey Gardens: An Irish garden that ‘is one of earth’s wonders’
Last winter's lockdown was still in force when we ran this piece telling the story of the determination of the resident community of Benedictine nuns and their eight-acre garden at Kylemore Abbey Gardens in Connemara, Ireland.
Your month-by-month checklist of what to do in the garden and when
Simply brilliant advice, given to us by Becky Crowley, formerly in charge of the cutting garden at Chatsworth.
Japanese Acers: The ultimate guide to what to grow, how to grow it and the best acer varieties for your garden
We're delighted to see how well-received this piece was — we've a true soft-spot for these most delicately pretty of trees.
Monty Don: The point of gardening
It’s to find solace, to be happy, to make beauty, have fun and muck about. How you do it doesn’t matter.' Monty's interview actually wentup on the site in late 2020, yet was still being read many months later.
The best herbs to grow in your garden aren’t the ones you use the most. Here’s why.
I recently moved to a new garden,' says Mark Diacono in this piece. 'Thankfully, it came with a house attached.' Now that's the mark of a true gardener.
Drummond Castle Gardens in winter: The winter beauty of the gardens made famous by Outlander
In the depths of winter at Drummond Castle is a garden made famous by the Outlander TV series. Caroline Donald told its story, with wonderful pictures by Clive Nichols.
Monty Don: How to stop worrying and learn to love gardening in November
November can be a depressing time for gardeners – but not if you dive in and make the best of it,
Credit: Getty Images
Carla Carlisle: 'I’m about to expand on my belief that reading fertilises our memories and allows us to visit our past without getting hurt when I see her eyes wander off towards Monty Don'
Books create a powerful connection with the home of your youth, finds Carla Carlisle.
The Gardens at The Manor, Priors Marston: A house bought on a same-day impulse that became a 20-year labour of love
The inspiration for the garden of The Manor, Priors Marston, Warwickshire, was to create a landscape to meander through, with
Carla Carlisle: 'I felt a surge of gratitude and hopefulness that’s hard to describe. You could call it Thanksgiving.'
A visit to St Paul's Cathedral provokes a flood of feelings in Carla Carlisle.
Arthur Parkinson: 'It’s a crime that we have forsaken our wildflower meadows for petrol lawnmowers and Flymos'
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Queen Victoria's chaplain's house on the Isle of Wight is for sale, and it's a riot of colour, charm and joyA stone's thrown from Queen Victoria's beloved Osborne House on the Isle of Wight, the house where her chaplain lived is now on the open market.
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‘One remembers not to give the Queen a thump of joyful friendliness’: Remembering Norman Parkinson — revolutionary fashion photographer and Cecil Beaton’s only homegrown rivalCecil Beaton might be the toast of London right now, with a new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, but contemporary Norman Parkinson was always hot on his heels.
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The one website about trees and shrubs that everyone needs to know about'Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles' has been digitised, making one of gardening's most important works free and at your fingertips.
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'Nature's loo roll': Verbascum, one of the most curious — and useful — plants you'll find in an English country gardenWith its ability to rouge cheeks, settle stomachs and operate as Nature’s loo roll, verbascum is as surprisingly useful as it is pretty, discovers Ian Morton.
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'There is only a handful of fruit trees I’d grow for their non-edible charms — quince is one'A versatile fruit that's superb in jams and with booze, quince also doesn't make you work too hard for all that pleasure.
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Everything you could ever want to know about growing, eating and cooking plumsMirabelles, gages, plums, damsons — the best ones to buy, the ones to avoid, and how to use them. Charles Quest-Ritson has you covered.
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Sophie Conran's garden at Salthrop Manor, and its journey from bare field to Cotswold paradiseThe walled garden at Salthrop Manor — home of Sophie Conran — hums with life and colour. It’s hard to believe that this was merely a field not so long ago, as Tiffany Daneff explains; photography by Ngoc Minh Ngo for Country Life.
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Alan Titchmarsh: You wouldn't think it, but Surrey is the most wooded of all England's counties — and its Scots pines are as beautiful as any of its treesAlan Titchmarsh is selling his house
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'Knowledge, energy, creativity and enthusiasm... He's a sensation': Meet the golden boy of English horticultureCharles Quest-Ritson meets the best of the next generation of gardeners tending to some of the nation's best gardens.
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What Britain's top garden designers are planting now to create dazzling spring meadows around their homesNon Morris reveals the techniques behind the contemporary take on William Robinson’s original idea of naturalising bulbs in long grass, creating an effect even more dazzling than a meadow.
