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History Hub

Exploring Garden History

Discover the people, places, styles and stories that have shaped our historic landscapes. The History Hub brings together resources from across the Gardens Trust to help you explore centuries of garden design, from visionary designers to iconic sites and enduring traditions.

Apollo and the Muses on Mount Helicon. Claude Lorrain, 1680.

Articles

Places

Perched on the north-eastern tip of the Isle of Wight, Norris Castle stands not only as a remarkable Regency Gothic Revival residence but also as home to one of the island’s most significant historic landscapes.

Periods

When we picture the gardens of the Roman period, our minds often leap to grand courtyards and marble statues, yet the reality was far more varied and influential than such images suggest.

Topics

From the Ancient Greeks via 17th century Dutch firefighters to modern day gardeners the history of the hosepipe is far from straightforward.

Topics

One of the greatest ‘inventions’ of the 19th century was the public park. Today, we all use them – and love them – but what do we actually know about them?

Garden Historians

Parks manager, historian, author and public speaker Dr Paul Rabbitts tells us how he began his career in parks management.

Topics

From private gardens to public parks, cemeteries, large estates and playgrounds, designed landscapes are all around us.

Topics

Our heritage of gardens, parks, and other designed ornamental and recreational landscapes are captured in the Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in England.

Topics

From allées to exedras, to hahas, Arts and Crafts gardens and the Anglo-chinois style, explore some of the features and styles of gardens throughout history in our a-z glossary.

Topics

From ancient shrines to 18th century entertainment spaces we explore the development of grottoes in gardens.

Topics

Designed to improve our health and community cohesion, playgrounds began as ‘gymnasia’ for all to use.

Topics

The idea that gardens can support healing is not a modern innovation, but a recurring theme within the history of designed landscapes.

Topics

Gardens Trust Trustee Chris Blandford OBE takes us on a tour of those with historic designed landscapes in the UK and the benefit this status brings