Gardens of Northumberland
For me it has to be the Quarry Garden at Belsay: a dramatic, sunken world of sandstone walls, cool shade and lush planting that feels almost other-worldly. I love the contrast of raw rock softened by ferns, hostas and towering trees, a garden that is both bold and beautifully serene.
About this tour
There is a moment every gardener knows: you step through a gate and instantly sense you are somewhere special. The air feels different, the planting has confidence, and your eye darts about trying to take it all in, the shapes, the textures, the combinations you would never have thought to put together. Northumberland delivers that feeling again and again.
I love gardens that are both beautiful and useful, places with strong structure, great planting and ideas you can borrow for home. A tour of Northumberland’s gardens is exactly that: a generous, inspiring collection, enjoyed at a relaxed pace, with plenty of time to really look.
Garden highlights
- The Alnwick Garden - contemporary ambition on a grand scale, with its great cascade and Poison Garden
- Cragside - National Trust woodland gardening, rhododendrons and Victorian innovation
- The Quarry Garden at Belsay - a sunken sandstone world of ferns, hostas and cool shade
- Lindisfarne - Gertrude Jekyll's walled garden on Holy Island
- Howick Hall - gardens and arboretum above the Northumberland coast
- Bide-a-Wee Cottage - an intimate plantsman's garden set around a former quarry
Destination highlights
- The dramatic Northumberland coast and Holy Island
- The bracing northern climate that shapes how these gardens are made
- Walled gardens with warm brickwork and sheltered borders
- Time alongside David and a like-minded group
Interested in this tour?
These tours come round again, and the best way to make sure you do not miss the next one is to join my email list. You will be among the first to hear when new dates are announced, with practical, seasonal gardening from me along the way.
What you'll learn
Northumberland is a lesson in gardening with the weather rather than against it. You will see how shelter belts, walls and hedges create the microclimates that let tender plants thrive in a bracing county, and how strong structure, topiary, hedging and well-placed trees, holds a garden together through every season. There is plenty here on using foliage as much as flower, building a planting palette that copes when the weather has other ideas, and reading how a garden leads your eye and creates atmosphere.
Gardens you'll visit
The Alnwick Garden
a modern garden with a big vision, theatrical and confident, from the great cascade to the famous Poison Garden.
Cragside
a National Trust garden like a living storybook, celebrated for woodland planting, rhododendrons and the blend of cultivated and wild.
The Quarry Garden at Belsay
a dramatic, sunken world of sandstone walls, ferns, hostas and cool shade. My own favourite here.
Lindisfarne
Gertrude Jekyll's small walled garden on Holy Island, set against the drama of the coast.
Howick Hall
gardens and arboretum above the coast, known for naturalistic planting and fine trees.
Bide-a-Wee Cottage
an intimate plantsman's garden created around a former quarry, full of personal plant choices to study close up.
Beyond the gardens
Northumberland’s gardens are rooted in a remarkable landscape, from the rhododendron woodlands of Cragside to the long coastal views out to Holy Island. Alnwick brings contemporary drama and a sense of theatre, Cragside carries a Victorian spirit of innovation, and the county’s walled gardens reward close looking. Seeing them in good company, with time to talk planting and design, is a real part of the pleasure.
Northumberland’s gardens are distinctive, surprising and deeply satisfying, and they stay with you long after you are home. My hope is that you leave with more than photographs: fresh ideas about shelter and structure, a notebook of plant combinations that work, and the particular lift that comes from seeing bold, characterful gardens in fine company.
Previous departures
A few moments from garden tours in Northumberland
