Garden and Green

National Trust Working Garden Holidays

If you love the beauty and variety of the National Trust's gardens, and would be interested in helping to tend them for everyone to enjoy, why not go and join in with a working holiday? Whether it’s preparing a kitchen garden for its seasonal crop, or planting bulbs for gorgeous displays, there is plenty to tempt you, whatever your age and experience.

Prices for Working Holidays start at £40 for weekend breaks and £75 for a week, and participants receive accommodation and all meals. Evening meals are prepared as a group and local and seasonal produce is used whenever possible.

Accommodation for most of the Working Holidays is in 'basecamps', including farmhouses, stone cottages, converted barns, mills, granaries and stableyards – even a former MoD radar station – situated in the heart of some of the most beautiful countryside. Premium holidays offer superior accommodation, with en-suite or more luxurious communal facilities.

Here is a selection of the working holidays on offer this spring and summer in some of the Trust’s most magnificent gardens and estates around the country.

Sunnycroft, Shropshire, 4 – 7 April, 2 – 8 August  

In the spring, help to awaken this delightful five-acre garden from its winter sleep, and in summer to keep it looking fresh and crisp for its summer visitors. There is always plenty to do in the gardens surrounding this unique survival of a late Victorian suburban villa.

Beningbrough Hall, Yorkshire, 9 – 11 May, 7 – 11 July

Help with planting and weeding of fruit, vegetables and flowers in the walled garden of this spectacular Georgian estate. The vegetables are grown for use in the restaurant and include both Victorian and modern varieties.

Waddesdon Manor, Buckinghamshire, 17 – 24 May  

Enjoy gardening on a grand scale with the planting of thousands of bulbs in the magnificent formal gardens at Waddesdon Manor. This is one of the finest Victorian bedding schemes in the country.

Hughenden Manor, Buckinghamshire, 24 – 31 May

Help to replace 7,500 spring bedding plants with summer bedding plants – and learn about ornamental bedding and random planting - on the glorious estate that was once home to Benjamin Disraeli.

Wallington, Northumberland 25 May – 1 June

There is something for everyone to do to prepare this lovely garden for summer, from planting dahlias and cannas, to dead-heading, weeding and staking.

Stourhead, Wiltshire, 12 – 19 July

Assist with preparations for Stourhead's Fête Champêtre, an annual event of music, picnics and glamour. Roping off shrubs and clearing undergrowth from the islands on the lakes are some of the tasks in this eighteenth-century landscape garden.

Ickworth, Suffolk, 17 – 23 August

Come and help the staff in this stunning 'Capability Brown' park, by clearing brambles and nettles from woodland garden walks, and with weeding and planting bulbs.

Sissinghurst Castle Garden, Kent, 17 – 23 August

For something a bit different, help to build a boardwalk in a lovely area of wet woodland in one of the world’s most famous gardens, created by Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicolson.

But it's not just gardens...

Along with the wide choice of garden working holidays, there are hundreds of other options across England, Wales and Northern Ireland including archaeology, conservation in historic houses, rural skills, coast and countryside, plus the Trust's 'Hidden Nature' holidays that help to protect rare or endangered wildlife and their habitats.

 

For more information on their Working Holidays, call the booking office on 0844 800 3099 or visit their website here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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