Hestercombe House & Gardens
With three centuries of garden design built on a diverse history of an estate dating back to an Anglo-Saxon charter of 682 Hestercombe is a fascinating venue to visit again and again.
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Best time to visit
The gardens are great to visit throughout the year, however visiting in spring and summer the gardens are a riot of colour, scents and alive with the buzz of bees and butterflies. The Gardens Trust has a great programme of events so it is always worth checking their website to see what is on
Look out for
With 20 hectares of formal gardens to explore there is plenty to see at Hestercombe. It is also home to lots of wildlife from Roe Deer bounding through the wooded gardens, to bats roosting in the house and buildings and lizards basking in the sunshine oon the gardens walls.
Getting there
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overnight.supper.match
TA2 8LG
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Facilities nearby
Toilets including a wheechair accessible toilet and cafe on site
Transport and parking
A large car park including coach parking avaliable on site
Accessibility
Accessible routes / Accessible toilet with baby-changing facilities in the stable courtyard. Designated parking / drop-off point / level access to gift shop, secondhand book shop in Hestercombe House, the Stables Cafe and Plant Centre / powered mobility vehicle avaliable / steps / uneven terrain in wider gardens
With a long history, including a stone archway dating from about 1280, Hestercombe is a fasinating place to explore. The current house dates from about 1680 with a major refit during 1725 and 1730 when most of the remaining medieval part of the house was taken down and replaced with the Georgain facade that survives today. However the jewel in HEstercombes crown are the recently restored formal gardens. These was designed by Edwin Lutyens with the planting scheme by Gertrude Jekyll in 1904 though were largley abandoned in the 1950s and only brought back to life with the creation of the Hestercombe Gardens Trust iin 1996. The Trust aquired the house in 2013 and now manages the site as a visitor attraction and venue.