Hotels and accommodation, activities and attractions in Somerset, Bath and Exmoor

Your Search

Additional Features

Garden Events
Tea Rooms

Description

The garden at East Lambrook Manor is recognised throughout the world as the ‘Home of English Cottage Gardening’, having been created in the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s by the late gardening icon, Margery Fish. Mrs Fish entered the world of gardening late in her life and as a novice she showed a quite brilliant talent for artlessly mixing the everyday plants with the rarer species, with an eye for colour, texture and form.
Her informal style of planting was unique and her work as an outstanding plantswoman, writer and journalist has made her one of the most important influences on gardening in the 20th century. Indeed, today’s mixed borders are a direct descendant of the style Margery Fish created here at East Lambrook Manor.

Mrs Fish’s relatives lovingly cared for the gardens after her death in 1969 and in 1985 the gardens passed out of the family to Mr & Mrs Norton.
The Norton's launched a major project to catalogue and re-find many of plants Mrs Fish had originally discovered and cultivated in the gardens and when the Williams family took over in 1999 the gardens were ready for an extensive and comprehensive restoration of the whole garden landscape – indeed, this was to be the biggest ‘overhaul’ of these famous gardens since their creation by Mrs Fish in the 1940’s and 50’s.

Now, in the new millennium, visitors can continue to enjoy the gardens while also visiting the famous ‘Margery Fish Plant Nursery’, which remains a place of pilgrimage for keen plant buyers. A specially designed display bed showcases an extensive and nationally recognised collection of hardy geraniums and the garden plays host RHS (Royal Horticultural Society) garden courses and the John Brookes Garden Design School.
In the centre of the gardens, the 17th century Malthouse houses a gift shop and a multi award winning tea shop serving homemade lunches and cakes and an art gallery with a rolling exhibition programme by West Country artists. There is currently one disabled toilet available for use by visitors.

Mrs Fish established the plant nursery in the mid 1950’s and the nursery has been selling specialist plants ever since. Today visitors are able to purchase over 800 different varieties of plants, the majority of which are still propagated by hand here in the gardens.