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Gardens
in Dumfries and Galloway.

It’s 20:58 in Dumfries and Galloway.
Dumfries and Galloway

Palms on the Gulf Stream.

The Gulf Stream warms the coast of Dumfries and Galloway, and its gardens make the most of it. On the Rhins, tree ferns and cabbage palms grow in a botanic garden that feels a long way from Scotland. In Kirkcudbright, the painter E A Hornel made a garden behind his pink-harled house, and near Castle Douglas a great garden sits beside a nature reserve. Visit in late spring for the colour.

Logan Botanic Garden→
Broughton House & Garden→
Threave Garden and Nature Reserve→
Garden of the day18 hours ago

Threave Garden and Nature Reserve.

The National Trust for Scotland's garden and nature reserve near Castle Douglas, a garden of many rooms made by trainee gardeners, with Threave House and a bat reserve.

Read about it
From the magazine15 hours agoThe printed copy of Issue 08Issue 08Spring / Summer 2024

After 18 months in Japan, the painter E A Hornel came home to Kirkcudbright in Dumfries and Galloway and made a Japanese-style garden at Broughton House.

Edward Atkinson Hornel was born in Australia, moved to Scotland as a toddler and became one of the Glasgow Boys, the influential circle of 19th-century painters, renowned for his flower-heavy canvases. His sponsored trip to Japan had a profound effect on his tastes and his work. Back on the Galloway coast, he and his sister designed a garden that borrowed from Japanese traditions and combined them with Edwardian know-how. Now mature and open to visitors, it holds over 1,000 different plants and trees, from wisteria and full moon maples to peonies and camellias, with winding paths, stepping stones and views across the River Dee.

See Broughton House & Garden · Dumfries and Galloway
From our guide9 hours ago

Logan Botanic Garden.

Here you’ll find blooms from Australia, New Zealand, South America and Southern Africa tangled in a zesty riot that thrills the senses. Thanks to warmth from the Gulf Stream, “Scotland’s most exotic garden” allows plants such as eucalyptus, palm trees and gunnera to thrive. Dating from 1869 and a regional garden of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, it also features a walled garden and conservatory houses, and picturesque benches aplenty.

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In Dumfries and Galloway7 hours ago

Pan's Cafe at Moat Brae in Dumfries becomes Brae on Friday and Saturday evenings, with Asian-inspired food and cocktails.

By day it is a café beside the gardens linked to J M Barrie's Neverland, where he played as a boy. Brae serves from 6pm, and tables can be booked on the café's website.

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From the magazine1 hour agoThe printed copy of Issue 06Issue 06Spring / Summer 2023

Tessa Knott bought 103 acres of moorland in Galloway unseen, and over four decades she turned it into Glenwhan Gardens, looking out over Luce Bay.

It was a gamble. What she found was wild and wiry moorland, blanketed in heather and bracken, and a ruined cottage that became the family home. What she made of it is now regarded as one of Scotland's most spectacular gardens. Glenwhan has an elegant arboretum and tree trail with over 160 species, a rock garden, a water garden, wetland, two lochans, and a potager and herb garden, with views over Luce Bay and the Mull of Galloway. In spring the rhododendrons and azaleas put on a spectacular display, and a moorland walk is threaded with around 120 types of wildflower and grass.

Read the full story in Issue 06
GardensJust now

Broughton House & Garden.

The pink-harled house where E A Hornel painted, and the garden he made behind it.

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