Wednesday 1st July 2026

Award winning Kiplin Hall, a 17th century estate, was the county seat of George Calvert, Secretary of State to King James 1st.
The hall is now furnished as a comfortable Victorian home, with a fascinating mix of centuries of items left by its owners. The delightful walled garden grows produce for the tearooms.

Kiplin Hall & Gardens Update 27/04/26

Hi everyone just to let you know the tour has now been booked and starts at 11.30 lasting for 1 1/2 hours. As we are leaving the club at 9am that should give us plenty of time to get refreshed and use the cafe before it starts. Looking forward to it and seeing everyone. Thank you, Sally

Some of the visits are on a Thursday as not all gardens are open on a Wednesday
Thank you to all those who have volunteered to help. It really helps to have so many enthusiastic people in our group.

Please note: If anyone knows anyone who wants to be included on the gardens WhatsApp please let me know. It is the best and ONLY WAY I can let people know if the visit has to be cancelled due to any unforeseen circumstances ( probably the weather), or if there is a change to the planned event.

Thank you Sally

When we went to collect our tickets, there were large planters, full of colourful tulips, around the ticket office and courtyard which, gave us an introduction to Raby in Bloom, the theme for this season.

We were able to join a guided tour of the walled garden led by Catherine, a young gardener giving her first tour. She was excellent and very knowledgeable after only a few weeks. The 5 acre, 18th century Walled Gardens have been redesigned by an Italian, Luciano Giubbilei who apparently likes his Mediterranean herbs and returns on a regular basis to check on their progress. Although why anyone would want to plant a mediterranean garden in the cold and windy grounds of a North Eastern castle is anybody’s guess. I assume it is a testament to the effectiveness of the walled garden that they survive. The purple and green sage plants were looking fine so we’ll have to return later to see whether Signor Giubbilei’s other herbs have done so.

We started in the central section of the garden where the clematis and wisteria were flowering on the walls adding a lovely splash of colour. The oldest elements of the garden were two massive, cloud pruned, yew hedges, designed to play ‘hide and seek with the castle’. As we moved around, they hid then revealed the castle beyond the walls. A rill bisected the garden from top to bottom, past the dipping pond then down to the end. A pump recycled the water back to the top. {it is called a dipping pond because the gardeners would fill their watering cans from it}.

The East Garden has herbaceous borders, not yet in flower, a massive Tulip tree over 150 years old and an extremely wonky building which looks as if the brickies were well refreshed when they built it. In the bottom section is a magnificent Taihaku cherry tree. This is the same as the one ones Collingwood ‘Cherry’ Ingram reintroduced to Japan in the early 1900’s. It is a beautiful tree and there are photographs of Lord Barnard playing around it when he was a boy. It is a very pretty and tranquil part of the garden and it leads onto the South Terrace through a wrought iron gate with the family crest. The terrace has only recently been replanted with wild flowers which they are hoping will be an asset to the gardens. The walls are well covered with espaliered fruit trees, and as it is south facing they apparently are very productive. This section is home to the white Ischia fig in its own glasshouse. They are very proud of this fig as its around 240 years old. Brought from Italy in 1786 by William Harry, Viscount Barnard, it still bears fruit every year.

The West Garden has magnolia trees underplanted with blue camassias. There will be lots of grasses later on. This also has the kitchen and cutting garden which provides produce and flowers for the house. There were some very pretty table decorations in the café. The Head Gardener has his house here, lucky chap, with a beautiful tree peony flowering at his door.

Belsay Hall - 4th March 2026

Our visit on Wednesday had a cloudy and chilly start, but after the obligatory cafe stop we walked out into sunshine.
The gardeners were hard at work preparing the grounds for the new season, trimming edges and mowing the lawns.
Our group photo with the house and a lovely tree in the background shows the sun shining on the righteous.🥰LOL
Crossing the croquet lawn we saw evidence of the lovely Summer planting to come in the borders. Although there was one shrub with such vicious thorns you wouldn’t want to bump into that any time soon.
A door, in the corner of the wall, led into the woods where the snowdrops were planted. A great sight and sign of spring.