While three of our four tours stay close to home in West Dorset, the fourth heads for altogether more famous territory: the Cotswolds, where some of England’s most celebrated gardens sit within a few miles of each other.

This is widely acclaimed as the most beautiful countryside in Britain, its gentle rolling hills dotted with picturesque villages and handsome towns built in gorgeous honey-coloured limestone. It’s a region that grew rich on the wool trade at a great time for English architecture, and which has always attracted the rich and powerful, from the Duke of Marlborough in the 18th century to rock squires and politicians in the 21st. Some of them have inspired great gardens to embellish their grand retreats.

Over the week we visit some of the finest gardens in England, including Hidcote, Kiftsgate, Sudeley Castle and the incomparable Rousham.

In true G&T style there are also exclusive events and visits to secluded gardens, including a visit to the magnificent private garden at Rockcliffe, and a day with the celebrated gardener, designer and watercolourist, Matthew Rice, at his home, Ham Court.

Here are the ones we visit.

Kiftsgate Court

Created over three generations by three generations of women gardeners, Kiftsgate is famed above all for its roses — in particular the enormous, shade-tolerant climbing rose that bears the garden’s own name. Set on a hillside with intimate, ever-evolving views, it was built in friendly rivalry with its neighbour, Hidcote.

Hidcote Manor Garden

That neighbour: an Arts and Crafts masterpiece created by the passionate plantsman and designer Major Lawrence Johnston. Over ten acres, the garden moves from small, formal “rooms” close to the house out into wilder areas that blend into the surrounding countryside. We finish our visit with a champagne tea in the Hidcote belvedere.

Bruern Abbey

The gardens at Bruern — right by Bruern Cottages, our own home base for the week — were restored from a state of bad neglect by the designer Angel Collins, commissioned by owners Lord Glendonbrook and Martin Ritchie in 2012. The eye-catcher is a long canal framed by beehive-shaped hornbeams; the real jewel is a Moorish-inspired courtyard garden, its narrow rills set off by deep-blue agapanthus.

Ham Court

The Bampton home of gardener, designer, and watercolourist Matthew Rice — who also happens to have designed G&T’s own logo. Beyond the moats, woodland, lawns, and vegetable garden, Matthew shares the secrets of botanical watercolour painting over an al fresco lunch. Among his many talents, he’s also a sought-after teacher, and plays the piano rather well.

Sudeley Castle

Ten separate gardens, first laid out in the 15th century, abandoned, and reclaimed by nature until a major 19th-century restoration led by Emma Dent. More recently, a succession of distinguished gardeners have worked with Elizabeth, Lady Ashcombe to re-imagine the gardens against the magnificent backdrop of the castle itself.

Sezincote

As unexpected as English gardens get: a Moghul palace and gardens created by Colonel John Cockerell, who made his fortune with the East India Company. Nothing else in the Cotswolds looks remotely like it.

Rousham

Perhaps England’s loveliest and most romantic garden — laid out in the early 18th century by the polymath William Kent, who pioneered the “natural” style of English landscape gardening here. As Horace Walpole put it, Kent “leaped the fence and saw that all nature was a garden.” Ha-has, picturesque vistas, and walled gardens survive largely as Kent left them. Our visit includes a private tour of the house, home to the Cottrell-Dormer family since 1635, followed by a picnic lunch in the grounds and a visit to the ancient, enigmatic Rollright Stones nearby.

Asthall Manor

Romantic organic gardens designed by Isabel and Julian Bannerman to flow into the Windrush Valley landscape — open views giving way to secret spaces, yew-bordered walks, a hidden lake enclosed by vast beeches, and a formal box-bordered parterre.

Rockcliffe

Created entirely from scratch over the last thirty years by Emma Keswick, Rockcliffe is now one of the finest gardens in the Cotswolds — an 8-acre showcase of plantsmanship and sculptural form.

Prefer West Dorset? Read our companion guide, The Great Gardens of Dorset, or see our Dorset or the Cotswolds comparison to help you choose.