Stourhead Garden

Stourhead
Stourhead Estate Office, Stourton, Warminster, Wiltshire BA12 6QD England

Admission prices Garden & house: £10.40, child £5.20, family £24.70. Groups £9.90. Garden or house: £6.20, child £3.40, family £14.90. Groups £5.40. King Alfred's Tower: £2.30, child £1.20, family £5.40. Groups £2 The magnificent landscape garden of Stourhead was created from 1741-80 and presents an English 18th-century view of an arcadian paradise.

Directions for Visiting: Stourhead garden is 9 miles south west of Warminster, 10 miles north west of Shaftesbury. In the village of Stourton, 3 miles north west of Mere off the B3029.

Garden Description: Stourhead is the best example of a garden inspired by the great landscape painters of the seveneeenth century. Ernst Gombrich suggests it should bear the signature of an Italianized French painter: Claude Lorrain (1600-82). The Stourhead garden was made by a wealthy English banker who had been buying works of art in Italy at the time he inherited the Stourhead estate. Henry Hoare II’s ‘Claudian’ garden was made in an unusually well-proportioned valley behind the house. The Temple of Flora at Stourhead was made in 1745 and the grotto in 1748. But the key date was 1754, when the lake and the Pantheon were made. It is based on the Pantheon in Rome and the planned walk through the estate is based on the journey of Rome's legendry founder, Aeneas. The five-arched bridge was made in 1762 and the Temple of Apollo in 1765. Gothic features were added later in the century: Alfred’s Tower, a Rustic Cottage and a Hermitage.The Stourhead woods were underplanted with Rhododendron ponticum after 1791 and with more exotic species in the twentieth century.

A pinnacle of English landscape style
Stourhead's 'natural' landscape surrounds a large artificial lake. Classical temples overlook and reflect in the water. The cool and shady lakeside grotto is inhabited by a nymph and a river god. Visitors are dazzled by daffodils and magnolias in spring and a stunning display of rhododendrons in early summer. Blazing autumn colour is provided by an extensive tree collection, which includes maples, tulip trees and redwood.

Seasonal highlights:

• Spring: daffodils, magnolias, rhododendrons
• Summer: rhododendrons, viburnum, magnolia, philadelphus, hydrangeas
• Autumn: hydrangeas, Indian bean tree, autumn colour