by Tony Russell

University of Oxford Botanic Garden

The University of Oxford Botanic Garden is the oldest in Great Britain.  It was first set up in 1621 when the First Earl of Danby gave five thousand pounds to set up a physic garden for ‘the glorification of the works of God and for the furtherance of learning’. Its plants are not laid out in a dry methodical way, but as an aesthetic celebration to the beauty of nature.

Such is the diversity of the plant collection that there is rarely a time of year when you cannot find something in flower or looking at its best. However, for me it is the autumn when the gardens are at their most charming. For then not only do you have vibrant leaf colours produced from choice trees such as the Persian ironwood Parrotia persica and katsura Cercidiphyllum japonicum, but also a superb array of interesting and colourful fruits such as those of both the pear and apple forms of the wild service tree Sorbus domestica. Combine these with autumn-colouring plants such as Euphorbia palustris and you really do have a spectacular garden for an October visit.

Location: Rose Lane, Oxford, opposite Magdalen College.
For admission prices and opening times, please check with the garden direct.
Telephone: 01865 286693

Whiteknights

Whiteknights is a private 2.5 acre garden landscape owned by Mrs Heather Bradley. It contains a whole series of individual and very different gardens, most of which reflect specific gardening styles and plants from other regions of the world, including Japan, China, Mexico and the Mediterranean.

There are areas devoted to cactus, a gravel garden, a garden of grasses, a collection of dwarf conifers and well-stocked herbaceous borders. There is even a fairy grotto and a doll’s house especially for children to enjoy. The area immediately behind the house is given over to sun-loving and drought resistant plants from the Mediterranean and may provide some ideas for future. In the Japanese area there is a delightful tea house and a series of water lily pools. Elsewhere there are two greenhouses, a lean-to conservatory and an organic vegetable garden. A succession of winding paths links the various components of this eclectic garden together. 

Location: Finchampstead near Wokingham on the B3348.
For admission prices and opening times, please check with the garden direct.
Telephone: 0118 973 3274

The Mill House, Abingdon

At the Mill House, owner Jane Stevens has developed a beautiful eight acre garden alongside the River Thames just south of Abingdon, on what was an original garden structure laid out by Peter Laycock, a colleague and friend of Eric Savill, of Savill Gardens, Windsor.

Given both Savill’s and Laycock’s interest in rare trees and shrubs, including magnolias, it is no surprise to find an excellent collection of both here, but this garden is about more than just woody plants. Stevens has planted an intriguing design using circles of comfrey. There are also formal plantings close to the Georgian House, three islands planted with masses of spring-flowering bulbs and wild flowers, old-fashioned roses for summer interest and superb autumn colours in October.

The old mill in the centre of the garden, now a ruin, was, up until the middle of the eighteenth century, used for printing banknotes. In the years leading up to the First World War, Mill House was the home of Herbert Asquith while he was Prime Minister.

Location: 1.5 miles south of Abingdon off B4016.
For admission prices and opening times, please check with the garden direct.
Telephone: 01235 848219