Bradon Farm Open Garden

Our little tea-shed down by the mill pond will be open this week! From 11am - 4pm depending on demand. Perfect for a stop off after a walk in the landscape gardens and before carrying on into the formal gardens!

This Friday (in time for Bee-autiful Friday!) the Tea Shed by the Mill Pond will open. Serving a selection of hot and cold drinks and snacks it is in the perfect location for a quick refresh ready to carry on and enjoy the rest of the gardens, or the activities that day. Plus this week we will be selling hot dogs cooked fresh on the BBQ for visitors to...

**Visitors will notice a new feature as they take the main drive towards Hestercombe House.**: Visitors will notice a new feature as they take the main drive towards Hestercombe House. A body of water currently awaits restoration to be transformed into an original Water Garden that formerly graced the estate. The Water Garden is situated in the parkland...

We all downed tools and went on a garden visit yesterday. Some may consider this a jolly but I think I have convinced everyone that it is a vital educational trip! And it is - we can all get a bit bogged down with whats going on in our own gardens and forget to look around us at our colleagues and competitors. So we boarded the mini bus and went to Prior...

**From 1st June - the Gardens Shop and Plant Centre will open from 11a.m. to 5p.m. daily And in the Winter months they will be open from 11a.m. to 4.30p.m.**: **From 1st June - the Gardens Shop and Plant Centre will open from 11a.m. to 5p.m. daily** And in the Winter months they will be open from 11a.m. to 4.30p.m.

We grow 50 acres of potatoes and milk 300 cows through robots, yielding 11,500l. We have a position open for a general farm worker. Duties would include: - helping our herdsman with cow duties - bedding up - looking after calves - help with potato grading - general tractor work The successful applicant must be enthusiastic, hard working and able to get...

The bluebell walk is open! Gotton Copse is full with beautiful blues as the bluebells burst into flower. Follow the signs, admission is included in your garden entrance fee.

We are looking for an experienced cook. Full and Part time available. Duties will include food preparation and cooking to order dishes from our Breakfast, lunch and afternoon menu in our busy cafe kitchen. Other duties will include maintaining a clean and tidy kitchen. Previous commercial kitchen experience is required. Our cafe is open between the hours of...

**UPDATE, 7th January 2021: *Please note: in line with the national lockdown, Hestercombe House and Gallery is temporarily closed. Read our full coronavirus statement for opening information.**: To visit Hestercombe House and Gallery (when reopen), you will need to book a gardens admission ticket, which also gives you entry to _Open-Up_, a new series of...

**The National Lottery Open Week returns for 2021, offering free entry and discounts at hundreds of venues across the UK this June, including Hestercombe Gardens**: - Hestercombe is proud to be taking part in National Lottery Open Week 2021 to help say thank you for support received from the LotteryTo say thank you for the £30million raised for good causes...

meaning that we can overwinter more plants. It is exciting times for us, so to get us fired up and to refresh our memories about glasshouse work, we arranged for a one day course, just for us, at Bicton college. We spent the day in the glasshouse with Janice Hindley, who took us through several propagation techniques, seed sowing, and glasshouse pest and...

'''Duties:''' - Perform landscape maintenance tasks such as mowing, edging, and trimming lawns - Plant and maintain flowers, shrubs, and trees - Operate power tools and equipment such as lawn mowers, trimmers, and blowers - Use hand tools for tasks such as pruning and weeding - Maintain cleanliness and organization of work areas '''Requirements:''' -...

"To me the sound of summer is the buzz of bees as they happily collect pollen from the plants. I have a real interest in pollinators and make sure that the plant centre stocks plants that encourage bees, butterflies and other insects. **Pollinators are important** Bees pollinate 3/4 of the world's most important crops. Sadly bee numbers have been...

Today is International Women's Day and I thought this was a great opportunity to celebrate some magnificent women in horticulture. And where better to start than with Gertrude Jekyll who designed the planting in the formal gardens at Hestercombe. Gertrude was born in 1843 and died in 1932. She had a very artistic start in life and her skills included...

**Hestercombe has a rich and diverse history; the first written record of the estate is from an Anglo-Saxon charter of 682.**: **Gardens History**: **Restoration**: **Hestercombe at War**: **Somerset Fire Brigade**: **Archives**: **Coplestone Warre Bampfylde**: **The Water Garden**: **The Terrace Seat**: The earliest remaining medieval feature of Hestercombe...

There’s little better than a butterfly fluttering past, a bee buzzing by or a dragonfly darting through when you’re pottering in the garden. You can make those chance encounters more likely by embracing wildlife gardening. Luckily, finding the balance between a wildlife garden and beautiful planting is easier than you might think. Here, we suggest five...

**Have you ever been scared to start a project in the garden because of the enormity of it? It happens to all of us, especially when deciding on the size of the flower beds.**: - By _Claire Greenslade_, Head Gardener_ "Have you ever been scared to start a project in the garden because of the enormity of it? It happens to all of us, especially when deciding...

by Claire Greenslade, Hestercombe’s Head Gardener_ **How do you manage a large garden with a furloughed team and locked down volunteers?!** Who knew that this would ever be a question I would have to ask myself. This virus is something that none of us had been able to prepare for. Since March 23rd 2020 Hestercombe has had to close its gates. Really big...

The job of the gardens team is always wide and varied but over the last couple of weeks we have all been working in the house to get some of the restoration work underway. Happily this has coincided with an awful lot of wet weather so the job couldn't be better timed! Over years of Somerset fire brigade and the County Council residing in the house it has...

Sunday 23rd September 11.30a.m. to 7.30p.m. Half Price Entry to the Gardens with your lecture ticket... An exciting line up of authors will be appearing at Hestercombe on Sunday 23rd September for the second day of the Taunton Literary Festival. It’s the second year of the festival and the first time this attractive venue has been used and promises to be a...