The Best Gardens in London

Kew Gardens is the daddy of the London gardens scene; a whopping 300 acres of prime West London real estate that’s chock-full of some 50,000 living plants, as well as Victorian glasshouses, galleries, temples, arches, a 60-foot-high treetop walkway and an even taller 18th-century pagoda. The view of the gardens (and London skyline) from the top of this 10-story Chinoiserie confection is a pleasure to behold, but you’ll find just as much joy strolling among the hothouse flowers and picnicking beneath great oak and silver birch trees.

Not to put too fine a point on it: if you only visit one garden in London, make it the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. Entry is included with The London Pass®, which can save you up to 50% on nearly 100 London tours, activities and attractions. 

Proving beyond doubt that size really doesn’t matter, Holland Park’s Kyoto Garden packs a mighty punch across its 22 acres. This perfectly manicured Japanese garden – a gift of friendship from the city of Kyoto – bears all the traditional elements you’d expect, and some you may not. We’re talking tranquil tiered waterfalls, stone lanterns, and a pond populated with colorful koi fish. But look out too for the resident ostentation of strutting peacocks, their showiness matched only by the blaze of the Japanese maples in autumn and the blushing pink cherry blossoms in spring.

West of Hyde Park’s Serpentine Lake lies Kensington Palace and Gardens. You’ll need a ticket to get inside the 17th-century royal residence (included with The London Pass®, natch), but access to most of the gardens is gratis. Inside the palace grounds, the Edwardian-style sunken garden features a statue of Diana, Princess of Wales.

Elsewhere, seek out the fairytale Round Pond with its graceful swans and babbling ducks, and look out for the whimsical statue of Peter Pan and neoclassical Queen Caroline’s Temple. Don’t miss the Albert Memorial on the gardens’ south side: Queen Victoria’s towering monument to her dear departed prince is a lavish Gothic Revival confection complete with gemstones and a flattering gilt bronze statue that's fit for, well, a prince.

An underdog in any list of London’s best gardens, Culpeper Community Garden is one of those surprising urban oases that you tend to stumble upon by accident. To do so is to be transported from the soot and grime of Islington high street to a tranquil, sense-stirring wonderland, all leafy arbors, weeping willows and fragrant wisteria. The park’s small community plots, each cared for individually by local residents, gives the sense of a cottage garden, and means there will often be someone around to chat with among the foxgloves and forget-me-nots.

Set in the heart of the mighty Richmond Park, the Isabella Plantation is hands-down one of London’s most beautiful gardens. The 40-acre woodland is best known for its dazzling spring azalea and rhododendron displays, all flamingo pinks, plum purples and fire-engine reds. And, as if that wasn’t manna enough for IG addicts everywhere, its forest floors are also carpeted with bluebells at around the same time. But there’s plenty more to see year-round in this Victorian valhalla, including bog gardens, reed ponds and an abundance of birds, bats and butterflies.

Check out our guide to the best parks in London – including Richmond Park – here.

Set along the north bank of the Thames and established way back in 1673, Chelsea Physic Garden is the oldest botanical garden in town. Its small-but-perfectly-formed four-acre plot remains dedicated to the cultivation of edible and medicinal plants, and there are tours available that allow visitors to sample the garden’s many flavours, as well as learning how to use plants and herbs to concoct remedies. Don’t miss the historic glasshouses with their eye-popping collection of species from the Americas and Atlantic islands.

Postman’s Park is the kind of cool and quirky hidden gem for which London is renowned. Despite lying a stone’s throw from both the Barbican and St Paul’s Cathedral this tiny garden is often overlooked by sightseers. At its heart is a Victorian-era red-brick monument to people who perished in the selfless act of saving a life, each memorialized in simple ceramic tiles. Meet Amelia Kennedy, Leigh Pitt, Mary Rogers, John Slade, Edmund Emery and other everyday heroes of the era, and enjoy a few moments of peaceful reflection on the surrounding benches.

Regent’s Park boasts not one but SIX gardens across its 400+ acres. Chief among these is the Queen Mary's Rose Garden with its picture-perfect ornamental lake, seasonal shrubs and borders and – as the name suggests – roses. Visit in June when the garden is at its showstopping best and some 40,000 blooms create a kaleidoscopic cascade of colours and scents.

Running the roses a close second, the stately Avenue Gardens (designed by John Nash, no less) features tired fountains and formal avenues of juniper, lime and tulip trees. Stop by in spring to catch rows of cherry blossoms in joyous pink bloom at the garden’s southern end.

Hidden away among the Barbican’s brutalist high-rises is a garden that’s as surprising as it is beautiful. Make your way to level four of the Barbican Centre, from where you can enter a world of pure imagination, all giant palms, cacti, weeping figs and other dense foliage that seems to hang suspended mid-air among the concrete buildings. 

It’s a little bit of tropical rainforest in the heart of London, complete with terrapins, koi carp and tiny little birds flown in from southeast Asia. Spend a while wandering the bridges and walkways of what is the largest London conservatory outside of Kew, and feels a million miles from the traffic-snarled streets outside.