Gardens of Kent & Sussex
Great Dixter is special because it is gardening with the volume turned up: fearless, generous and brilliantly alive. Every visit feels different, which is exactly the point. Dixter reminds me that gardens are never finished, they are always becoming.
About this tour
Kent and Sussex are a true honeypot for gardeners. The light is generous, the climate is kind, and the landscape has that irresistible mix of rolling countryside, ancient woodland, orchards, oast houses and coastline. I love how quickly people relax here, and how these counties make you want to look closely: at the way a hedge frames a view, at how a border is edited for rhythm, at a garden that feels both deeply English and quietly experimental.
What makes this tour such a pleasure is the variety. We move between iconic, plant-led gardens and grander settings where history and design are written into the land. Because Kent and Sussex have long been magnets for passionate gardeners, you find a distinctive confidence here: gardens that impress not with gimmicks but with craft, good structure, thoughtful planting, and atmosphere you cannot fake.
Garden highlights
- Sissinghurst Castle Garden - the famous garden rooms and romantic planting
- Great Dixter - fearless plantsmanship in a garden that never stands still
- Nymans - a romantic woodland and walled garden in the High Weald
- Scotney Castle - a picturesque garden around a moated ruin
- Great Comp - a plantsman's garden of structure and rare plants
- Borde Hill - parkland, woodland and bold herbaceous borders
Destination highlights
- Garden rooms, hedges and structure that lets planting run free
- Succession planting and fearless colour at Great Dixter
- The warm, sheltered climate of England's garden heartland
- Orchards, oast houses and the Wealden landscape
- A region with generations of plant people, nurseries and designers
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
These counties are England’s garden heartland and a masterclass in planting with confidence. You will look at how structure, hedges and clipped forms create the calm that lets borders be exuberant, how succession and texture carry a garden from one moment to the next, and how to build year-round interest with evergreens, seed heads and carefully chosen shrubs. Sissinghurst teaches composition and restraint, Great Dixter gives you permission to be braver, and there are ideas here for any garden back home.
Gardens you'll visit
Beyond the gardens
Part of the pleasure is the setting: the rolling Weald, the orchards and oast houses, the ancient woodland and the coast. These are counties that have shaped what we think of as English garden style, and between visits there is time to enjoy the countryside and the easy, unhurried pace that makes this corner of England such a pleasure to garden in.
By the end of the tour my hope is that you will feel you have experienced a region that truly understands gardens, not just as places to visit but as living works of craft, shaped by climate, history and people who care about plants. It is a tour that leaves you with a sharper eye, a fuller notebook, and that familiar gardener’s itch to get home and try something new.