Garden details

Telephone

01408 633177

Location

Admission

Castle & Garden: Adults £10; OAPs £8; Children £5.50. Reductions for groups & families. RHS members free (Member 1 only).

Features

• Bluebells
• Herbaceous plants
• Daffodils
• Disabled facilities
• Fruit of special interest
• Snowdrops
• Good topiary

Comment

The grand terraced gardens at Dunrobin were laid out in 1850 by Sir Charles Barry, architect of the Houses of Parliament. Their formal style, striding down to the Dornoch Forth, is appropriate to the enormous French-style château. Three immensely grand parterres surround the fountains, two traditionally bedded out (but brilliantly and colourfully done) and one planted with hardy geraniums and Ceratostigma willmottianum, underplanted with tulips and lilies. One of the parterres was substantially made in recent years, and thereby much improved: some 20 wooden pyramids have been planted with clematis and climbing roses in a modern reinterpretation of 19th-century grandeur. Elsewhere are lots of interesting plants: Akebia quinata; expansive clumps of gunneras; tall fuchsias (including F. 'Dunrobin Bedder'); Ceanothus thyrsiflorus with eccremocarpus threading through it; huge maples, limes and horse-chestnuts (much taller than one might expect so far north); a long herbaceous border where plants grow unusually tall; and extensive rhododendron woodlands. A recent addition is a long raised bed featuring more old Fuchsia cultivars grown in tiers alongside ferns and pale petunias.