Wanting to visit a stunning garden in NSW on the weekend but not sure where to start? If cottage gardens or lush parks are what you’re looking for, we’ve got you covered.
WATCH: Graham visits Lindesay Garden
Over the years, Graham has visited a plethora of gorgeous gardens and parks in Sydney and beyond. If you’ve always wanted to visit one, what’s stopping you? Here’s a round-up of the 10 best gardens in NSW for you to experience ornamental gardening, exotic plants and more.
Blue Mountains
1. Breenhold Gardens
Full of magic and mystery, Breenhold Gardens covers over 45 hectares of expansive parklands. You’ll find everything from pine plantations to six individual walled gardens, an extensive collection of trees from around the world and more. It’s like stepping into the pages of a fairy tale.
One of the most extensive privately-owned gardens in the country, the unique heritage-listed Garden Estate of Breenhold at Mount Wilson is open in Autumn and Spring to share with visitors and available for weddings, film shoots and special events throughout the year. Fun fact, they filmed a scene of Baz Luhrmann’s Great Gatsby on site.
Visit: Daily 10am to 4pm during autumn and spring only
Autumn 2022: 9th April – 29th May
Spring 2022: 3rd Sept – 30th October
For more info: www.breenhold.com.au
2. Everglades House & Gardens
Take in the spectacular beauty of NSW’s Blue Mountains with a visit to the Art Deco-style Everglades House & Gardens at Leura. An elegant 5.2ha National Trust property, the garden was designed by Danish-born Paul Sorenson. Including stunning mountain views, kilometres of stone walls and romantic hillside terraces, it’s open Thursday to Monday.
The tea rooms are currently closed but you can bring your own morning tea, lunch or afternoon treat and enjoy a picnic on the beautiful grounds instead.
For more info: nationaltrust.org.au/places/everglades-house-gardens
3. Ewanrigg Garden
Enchanting and magical are two words often used to describe Ewanrigg Garden in Leura, located in the picturesque Blue Mountains. Planned as a series of connecting rooms the garden unfolds with a series of meandering paths taking you on a journey of discovery.
For more info: leuragardensfestival.com.au/our-gardens/ewanrigg
4. Hartvale Gardens
Established roughly four years ago, Hartvale sits on 2ha of gentle rolling land in Little Hartley at the base of Mt York, west of the Blue Mountains, NSW. The garden is a canvas of vivid colours with cottage favourites such as lavender, penstemons, salvias, coneflowers, roses, dahlias and California poppies.
It features a traditional potager garden, kitchen garden and open art studio. While new, the garden has the feel of being well established, with old railway sleepers repurposed into garden bed edges, rusty corrugated iron and tin drum planters, and tossed out pieces of wrought metal that have been retrieved and given new lives as pieces of art.
For more info: myopengarden.com.au
5. Windyridge Garden
If you’re looking for inspiration for your garden, think big and visit the rambling estate of Windyridge at Mt Wilson, west of Sydney. Here, the natural beauty gently rolls down across 2ha of lawns, where cool-climate shrubs, trees and the Australian bush are integrated to create a series of rooms that are seemingly without walls. Every bit of this garden will stimulate your plans to turn your patch – big or small – into paradise!
Windyridge Garden includes a nursery that sells cuttings from plants in the garden, as well as a range of Japanese maples – for which the garden is renowned – brought in from specialist nurseries.
Visit: Every day, 9am-4.30pm
Cost: $10 for adults, $3 for children under 12
For more info: windyridgegarden.com
Bodalla
6. All Saints Garden
A five hour-drive south of Sydney, you’ll find the charming villages of Bodalla, Tilba Tilba and Central Tilba nestled between lush countryside and beautiful beaches. At All Saints Garden, you’ll find acres of fairytale-like gardens that are full of country charm.
Visit: Open on the weekends from 11am to 4pm. No pets allowed. The garden closes on rainy days.
Cost: Entry fee is $10.
Keep an eye out on their Facebook or Instagram for up to date information and additional opening dates and times.
Central west
7. Hillandale Gardens
The Central West of NSW may be famous as the home of Australia’s biggest car race, the Bathurst 1000, but there’s so many more reasons to give the area a spin. Tucked behind the Blue Mountains, this region is full of history and hidden gems, including Hillandale Gardens, a stunning country garden with an epic border of perennials over 100 metres long, it’s a walk you’ll remember.
With a shed, glasshouse, green lawns and a creek that runs the length of the property, it comes to no surprise that Hillandale is a popular wedding location in NSW.
For more info: www.hillandalegardens.com.au/
Shoalhaven River
8. Merribee Gardens
Clean up your clippers and sharpen your shears, you need to make a trip to NSW’s Shoalhaven River to visit a stunning garden that’s a complete paradise for topiary lovers. At Merribee Gardens you’ll find regular backyard shrubs transformed into living, breathing sculptures with meticulous precision. You’ll also find some gorgeous blooms and even a potager garden, so it’s fair to say this place is bursting with inspiration.
Merribee is home to approximately 1300 rose bushes. This includes 130 species and cultivars. With four designated areas devoted to roses, there are even two picking gardens where flowers are cut and sold to the public.
Currently closed for the winter season, the garden will re-open to the public in spring.
For more information, head to www.merribee.com.au
Southern Highlands, Bowral
9. Greenbrier Park
Greenbrier Park in the Southern Highlands of NSW was one man’s dream with a vision to create a country garden within an original Australian setting. Complete with a hidden garden, sunken garden, arboretum and tranquil ponds, it even has a ruin!
Over the seasons, Greenbrier Park is also open by appointment only for pre-arranged garden tours/groups for Garden Clubs and Charitable Events. For enquiries please email: [email protected]
Sydney harbour
10. Lindesay Garden
A stroll through a slice of history that’s still alive and kicking on Sydney’s foreshore provides a picture-book look at the evolution of the modern garden. The grounds of Lindesay House in Darling Point, built in the 1830s, were laid out at the peak of the English informal ‘landscape design’ of rolling lawns and organic clumps of trees and shrubs. They reveal the passion of the period – plants sourced from exotic countries as European explorers navigated the far seas and brought back trophies of discovery. It’s a design style still going strong almost 200 years later with lots of ideas for your garden!
Now run by the National Trus the pristine garden is kept going by an army of volunteers. The garden capitalises on the cool and temperate conditions during autumn and winter and the sub-tropical heat of summer.
Visit: Tours on the first and third Wednesday of each month at 10am and 11am. Tours last about 45 minutes
Cost: Adults $10, concession/children over five $8, child under 5 free
For more info: www.nationaltrust.org.au/nsw
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