Inspirational Spring Gardens

The places I get my ideas from

The only trouble with visiting beautiful gardens is the constant desire to copy the ideas you find in each of them. I am always beguiled by amazing planting combinations, falling in love with new plants and wanting to change things in my own garden after I come back from visiting other gardens. My phone is stuffed with thousands of images snapped as I walk round, my head swimming with ideas, my brain desperately trying to retain all the plant names.

So here I introduce you to some of the gardens I have visited in previous springs and some of the ideas I have taken from them, starting in Holland, the obvious place to go for spring bulb inspiration. Hortus Bulborum, an hour north of Amsterdam, is the most amazing garden. It’s not on a domestic scale and it’s not intended to showcase planting combinations or design; it is simply designed to be a living catalogue of spring bulbs from narcissus and tulips to the incredible fritillaries shown in the picture above.