Open Gardens Scheme

[spod]

Has anyone participated in the open gardens scheme and opened up their garden to the public? I am considering taking part this year. What i need to know is, does my garden need to be perfect, or just pretty? What happens on the day? Or have you visited open gardens before? what did you think, what were the best ones and why?

You sound as if you must have a beautiful garden! I am very jealous!!

not that beautiful just yet! But it will be one day i hope... only lived here for a year so its still young. Have now dug a veg patch which I'm excited about! We back onto woods, so its a nice view. I'm starting up a gardening business so wondered if I should particpiate in the open gardens... free publicity and all that!

Gardening for a living - how fantastic!! Am REALLY jealous now!! I couln't do it though, i'm only a novice ATM!!!! And i would love a veg patch!!

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Ooh, I love open gardens. And no, they don't have to be perfect - in fact some are absolutely nothing special at all, but it's just nice to wander about and have a nose. My favourites are where there are tea and buns, actually. It's to raise money for charity usually so people are very forgiving....esp if they are eating cake at the time. The kids get roped in as cake sellers usually. And actually I do really like gardens as well as cake! I like to see all sorts of gardens from big to small to get ideas from.

Yes - we only go to ones that says "Teas"! But we do like the gardens as well! Some colleges open their grounds under this scheme and then you can a good walk out of it too!

In reply to Spod, the best gardens tend to be the small ones - plenty packed in and very pretty. And if you can find some spare plants to sell, that's usually a draw.

Yes, plant sales are also excellent. A nice sunny day, a spot of cake and a few plants and I'm a happy woman

We have open gardens in our village each summer, for one day only, £5 a ticket and all the money goes in the local charity pot. We're hopefully opening ours this year too ... I've got loads of ideas for our garden from other peoples gardens in the village. IMO, although people don't expect your garden to be an acre, they do expect it to be very well maintained. What I love about visiting other people's gardens, is the unexpected garden, the one that you would never have believed was there and are amazed at IYKWIM. FWIW, we only have a small garden but it's very tidy

My dad is part of the National Gardens Scheme organisation for Cheshire, he's opening his twice this year (it's not very big but packed with plants). He goes around other potential gardens wanting to open and sees if they're suitable, most are. Generally your garden should offer 45 mins of interest but my dad opens his garden with 2 or 3 others nearby to get good value for money for the visitors. This website has loads of info www.ngs.org.uk/openyourgrdn.htm to get you started....go for it.