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Garden Owners,
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Armchair Travel Co Ltd
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Garden Name: Hestercombe Gardens
Last Modified: 26/01/2011
Garden ID: 0318

pic: 0318_Hestercombe.jpg

Owner: Jackie Manning
Address:
Cheddon Fitzpaine
Taunton

Postcode: TA2 8LG
County: Somerset

tel: 01823-413923
fax: 01823-413747
website: www.hestercombegardens.com
email: info {at} hestercombe.com

Features: 
Formal Edwardian garden designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll and a 40 acre Georgian landscape garden with lakes, cascade, temple & witch house.

English Heritage Grade:
II*

Opening Times:
All year; 10am - 6pm, or dusk if earlier, (Last admission 5pm). Closed Christmas Day
Garden Shop & Plant Centre: daily 10a.m. to 5.30p.m. (5pm. Oct-Mar)
Courtyard Cafe: daily 10a.m. - 5.30p.m. (5pm. Oct - Mar)

Best Times of Year to Visit: 
May
May - Oct
Autumn

To see: 
Foxgloves and bluebells
Formal gardens
Native trees in autumn colour.

National Collection: 


National Garden Scheme days: No
Comments: 

Parties / Coaches: Yes 
Comments: Minimum of 20.

Viewing by Appointment: Yes
Comments:  

House Open for Viewing: No
Comments: 

Admission Prices:
Adult £9.50 (incl. 2 children); Additional Child £3.60; Over 60s £8.60; Half price / reciprocal adults £4.75
Half price / reciprocal Senior Citizens £4.40; Students £4.75; Wheelchair users £4.75 (helper is Free)

Parking: Yes
Lavatories: Yes
Disabled Access: Yes
Shop: Yes
Plants for Sale: Yes
Lunches: Yes
Teas: Yes
Refreshments: Yes
Picnics: Yes
Dogs allowed: Yes
Only on Lead: Yes
Events: Yes

Other Facilities:



Designer: Coplestone Warre Bampfylde, by Sir Edwin Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll
Description of Garden:
At Hestercombe you can lose yourself in 40 acres of walks, streams and temples. The formal terraces, woodlands, lakes and cascades abound with views that will take your breath away. Hestercombe is a unique combination of three period gardens. The Georgian landscape garden was created in the 1750's by Coplestone Warre Bampfylde, whose vision was complemented with the addition of a Victorian terrace and shrubbery and the stunning Edwardian gardens designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens and Gertrude Jekyll. All once abandoned, the gardens are now being faithfully restored to their former glory. Each garden has its own quality - tranquility, wonder, inspiration - refreshing the visitor body and soul.


History: 
Hestercombe was first mentioned in an Anglo-Saxon charter of 854, and from 1391 until 1872 was continuously owned by one family, the Warres. The first reference to a garden at Hestercombe is from the estate accounts of Sir Francis Warre for, ironically, pulling down a garden hedge in 1698. In 1731 John Bampfylde, MP for Exeter, who had married Sir Francis's daughter Margaret in 1718, commissioned plans for a garden from a Mr Brown of London. 

Coplestone Warre Bampfylde designed and laid out the Landscape garden we know today after inheriting the estate from his father in 1750. The Victorian Shrubbery and Terrace were laid out in the 1870's and the beautiful formal Edwardian garden designed by Lutyens and planted by Jekyll was completed in 1906. Restoration of the formal gardens began in 1973. Restoration of the landscape gardens began in 1995.

Local Inns: 
Rose & Crown, Woodhill, Stoke St. Gregory
Rose & Crown, East Lyng
Fitzhead Inn, Fitzhead

Accomodation: 
Rose & Crown, Woodhill, Stoke St. Gregory
Bashford's Farmhouse, West Bagborough
Saltmoor House, Burrowbridge
Fulford Grange (B&B) - Kingston St. Mary (5-Star)

Restaurants: 


Village/Town/Sightseeing: